


Broken World

by sanashi27



Category: Re:Kinder, 終わりのセラフ | Owari no Seraph | Seraph of the End
Genre: Child Abuse, Dead People, Gore, M/M, Might be OOC, Murder, Suicide, attempted suicide, game xover, implied rape, kinder au, mild swearing, supposedly horror, takumi dies again
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-13
Updated: 2016-05-04
Packaged: 2018-04-26 05:04:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 43,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4991311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanashi27/pseuds/sanashi27
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A young boy returns to his home country to reunite with those he left behind. Meanwhile, a storm is brewing and students are asked to return home. What is supposed to be a normal day turned grim as everyone started to disappear.</p>
<p>Inspired by the game Re: Kinder</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. CHAPTER 1- Dark Days

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the free RPG game Re:Kinder. Created in a whim because Yuu's name and horrible family life reminded me of one of Re: Kinder's character(Yuuichi Mizuoka = Yuuichirou Hyakuya/Amane). It's my 1st OwaSera fic so the characters might be ooc and I'm not good with horror but I tried. The main pairing is MikaYuu but the story isn;t really romance-centric and the POV changes when the characters split-up. I hope you enjoy this.
> 
> Wanna play Re: Kinder? http://www.vgperson.com/games/rekinder.htm

_“… And the prince defeated the dragon and saved the beautiful princess. He promised to never leave her and then shared a kiss. They lived happily ever after.”_

_The young boy looked at the book being held up in front of him. He stared at the colourful images of a dragon fighting a prince and on another page, of a princess whose hand is held by the price while both smiled. “A prince, huh? There’s no prince or a knight around here, you know.”_

_“Wha—uh, well, then I’ll be both- the prince and a knight! I’d slay the dragon and save you princess.” The young boy couldn’t help but laugh despite being called a ‘princess’ by the smiling young boy in front of him “Right… then you’d protect me from the scary dragons? You’re small and dragons are big.”_

_“I could do it! Just believe in me. I’m your prince after all…”_

\---

A boy wrapped himself in a thick blanket. His room was dark and messy and the broken window is covered with several newspapers taped on to it. The young boy with messy black hair which covered part of his face held onto his chest a red book. With a voice tinged with sadness, he muttered “It’s too late…”

With no one else in the room, the boy heard a whisper-like voice that sounded like it came from somewhere close yet far “I guess it’s up to me then.”

Pitch black darkness then envelops the entire room slowly like smoke.

\--

12 year old Mikaela Tepes looked out the window of the plane he was on. He broke into a smile as he saw them near the landing. It’s been 2 and a half years since he left Japan after his adoption and he missed his ‘family’ from the orphanage. He constantly writes back and forth with Akane- a fellow orphan who was like a sister to him. According to her, most of the other kids they used to live with had already been adopted but she chose to stay at the orphanage to help out.

“You seem excited.” Krul Tepes- the pink haired woman who has the appearance of a child in her early teens- sitting next to him spoke “You’d have to wait for a while because we still have to go back to our house for the night, Mikaela.”

“I know, mother.” The boy looked at his adoptive mother “It’s just been so long since I’ve seen my brothers and sisters! I missed them a lot.”

The house in Japan the Tepes family lives in is smaller compared to where they lived in when they were still abroad but it’s big nonetheless. Mika had only lived here for a week before they went abroad all those years ago so the house still felt new to him despite the feeling of slight nostalgia. There’s a garden out front and a huge backyard behind the house and there are at least 5 bedrooms upstairs and 2 downstairs for their housekeepers and a huge kitchen, living room and a playroom(which he wishes he could share with his siblings from the orphanage).

He located his room upstairs near the end of the hall and went inside to unpack. Inside was a big bed(that could probably fit two people), a door leading to his own private bathroom, a huge bookshelf, and several closets and drawers on one side. Opening the closets to see how much space he’s got, he noticed a few small boxes inside which are probably things he wasn’t able to take when they left. He got them out and opened them one by one.

Inside one were his old clothes from when he was younger(his new mother bought him new ones already so he hadn’t needed to bring them), another had some toys he got from donations in the orphanage, and the last one had children’s books. He took one of the books from the pile inside and flipped it open. They were still good despite being used. He then thought about giving all of them to the orphanage for the new kids when he finally visits.

“I’m sure they’d love these! Hey…” Mika took out all the books and to his wonder, there seems to be one missing “I’m sure there was one more. Hmm… oh, well.”

He proceeded to put all of the things back in their boxes and push the boxes all in one corner as he unpacked his new things and placed them in their respective places in his room. After he went downstairs to dinner, he made a phone call to the orphanage, hoping that they’re still awake.

“Hello?”

“This is Hyakuya orphanage, who might it be?” a middle aged woman answered on the other side

“Mrs. Director? It’s me, Mika! I know it’s already late but I just wanted to tell you guys that I’ve arrived in Japan!” Mika says happily

“Oh my, Mika is that true? That’s great news! When will you be able to visit? I’m sure they’d be happy to see you. The kids miss you so much!” before Mika could reply, he heard someone else on the other line

“Is that Mika? Is he really back?” he hears a voice of a girl whom he assumes is probably Akane “Can I talk to him, please? Thanks!” then the voice sounded closer “Hello, Mika?”

“Akane!”

“Mika, are you really back in Japan?”

“Yeah! Mother said I could probably visit tomorrow. I can’t wait to see you guys again! And, hey—are you crying?” Mika asked as he heard faint sobs in the background

“Yeah, sorry… it’s just been so long and we really, really wanted to see you again.”

“Me, too.” The two spent a lot of time talking before the director asked for the phone back and reminded both that it’s late and that they’ll see each other soon. They said their goodbyes and hung up. Mika went back to his room and checked his phone’s album. He stared at the pictures sent to him by his siblings while reminiscing about his childhood days. He fell asleep with a smile in his face knowing he’d see the other place he used to call home, again.

\--

In the next town over where the quiet orphanage stood, while the sky above is covered with shining stars, a little farther away are dark clouds slowly drifting closer and closer.

\--

Mika put on his black t-shirt and a white jacket and a pair of pants. He hurriedly went downstairs for breakfast.

“Slow down will you. You might trip.” Krul said nonchalantly as she sat at the head of the dinner table eating breakfast.

“Hehe I’m just really excited for today. Mother, I found some of my old things back in my room and I thought about giving them away to the orphanage.” Mika said as he started eating his breakfast.

“I see, well I’d ask someone to help you carry them to the car later. For now, eat.”

“Alright! Thanks, mother.”

Krul watched the boy happily eating his breakfast and remembered how the child smiled and put on a brave face when saying goodbye to the people he considered family when he was leaving for the airport back then. He didn’t show anyone how he truly felt until they got to their new home and he cried alone in his room. She admired the boy’s personality and at that moment thought that she wouldn’t regret adopting him. Mikaela proved to be an interesting company and a wonderful child so she agreed to go back with him to Japan when the boy suggested it. She wouldn’t say it but she was happy to see him happy.

\--

Hyakuya Orphanage was located at the next town so it was awhile before they reached their destination. As they came closer to the town, the cloudier the sky went and soon, even the road got a bit foggy. Despite the crappy weather, Mikaela’s happiness and the smile on his face didn’t lessen. In fact, the closer they got to the orphanage, the more excited he got so when the car finally parked outside the facility’s gate, he immediately opened the door and jumped out of the car. Waiting for him outside the door of the orphanage is Akane who, when she saw him, ran towards the gate. They two kids hugged and looked at each other.

“Mika, I’m so happy to see you!” Akane said to her ‘brother’.

“Me, too, Akane and woah! You’ve gotten taller!” Mika said, looking at the brown-haired girl who still wore her hair in a braid like when they were younger but unlike then, she wore more feminine looking dresses making it more obvious that she’s now a pre-teen instead of a little kid.

“Not as much as you! You’re still taller than me though but still!” Akane said as she raised her hand to compare their height “And you’re looking more and more of a foreigner instead of just a half.”

They later on went inside and the kids greeted them. The new kids are still a bit wary of Mika but his cheerful and kind ‘big brother’ personality soon won them over. As Mika looked around, feeling nostalgic about how little things have changed inside his old home, his mother was left talking to the director.

“So, are you just on vacation or are you gonna live here again?” Akane asked as Mika taught the little kids how to play one of the toys he brought.

“Well, we’d probably go back to living abroad someday but for now, I’d be here in Japan. Mother is currently taking care of the papers I’d need to transfer to a school here.”

“Really?”

“Yep! I can visit here more often then.”

\--

Outside, the wind is picking up and it seemed as if a storm is gonna hit.

A couple of kids playing in the park ran home and the others ran a little ways off the road home to a small dirt road that lead to a small clearing. In the middle of a few thick trees is a house made of wood. It wasn’t big but it was enough to fit a few people. Inside was a wooden bed covered with a lone bedsheet and a pillow, a few wooden chairs and a small chest. “I hope this isn’t a big storm. I won’t be able to go home then…” a purple haired girl spoke as she looked outside the window.

“That’s what you get for skipping class. I shouldn’t have listened to you and just stayed in school!” a blonde twin-tailed girl complained “Honestly, you’re such a pain, Shinoa!”

“Oh but Micchan…” the girl called Shinoa said in a mocking voice “I didn’t force you to skip with me didn’t I? How is it my fault?”

Mitsuba glared at her friend and then angrily sat on the bed “Ugh, I hate you so much right now!”

“But I love you, Micchan!” Shinoa then giggled at the blushing Mistuba who looked more annoyed than she did earlier.

\--

“No running in the hallways! Go straight home alright!” A teacher said as the students were let out earlier as there seemed to be an impending storm “Those whose houses are too far off and have no one to pick them up can stay here in school and wait it out. Those who would be going home, careful on your way back!”

“You guys aren’t staying?” a boy asked as he saw many of his classmates leave

A brown haired child looked back at his classmate and replied “No, my house is close by and my parents aren’t home. My sister is picking me up soon. I don’t wanna leave here by herself.”

“As expected of Yoichi! Such a nice kid, you are. Everyone else though, don’t you guys wanna stay here and have fun in school?” one of the other boys said

“What the hell is so fun about school? I thought you guys are itching to get out?!” a boy at the back of the room shouted back

“When we’re studying, stupid! We’re gonna explore the school when everyone else is out. Like a test of courage while the storm rages outside later.”

“Tch” a pink-haired boy then caught up to Yoichi in front of the class and said “Study? When do you idiots ever study?”

“F*ck off, Shihou!”

“Hey, we’re not allowed to curse in school! What if the teachers hear you?” Yoichi worriedly reminded his classmates

“They’re too busy outside so don’t worry about it.”

“Yeah, Yoichi. Stop worrying about these idiots and let’s just go.” The pink-haired boy said as he ushered Yoichi outside of their room

“But Kimizuki-kun!”

When they finally got out, the two boys waited outside the gate to wait for Yoichi’s sister. They watched as the other students hurriedly left school as the wind blew a bit harder. Kimizuki then put his phone back on his pocket.

“That Shinoa… she’s at the secret base with Mistuba.” He told Yoichi “I just talked to her on the phone and they’re apparently gonna wait it out in the base before I told them that classes were cancelled.”

“Eh, so they’re going home then? Shinoa-san’s and Mistuba-san’s houses are still in the next town right? I hope they could get back home okay.”

As the wind blew, they heard screams from inside the school and when they looked back, the lights were flickering in the hallways and soon, a thick fog suddenly enveloped their surroundings. Soon they heard more panicked screams from people around them causing many of the students to flee. Kimizuki held onto Yoichi’s arm and pulled the both of them on the side to avoid the stampede of people.

“Yoichi!” a girl’s screams Yoichi’s name somewhere in the middle of the crowd

“Sis! Were right here!” Yoichi screamed back and soon, his older sister had found them and hugged Yoichi

“What’s going on?” His sister let him go and stared at both of the boys

“I’m glad you and Shihou-kun are okay. I’m not really sure what’s going on. I’ve bumped into some people and I could’ve sworn some of them suddenly disappeared!”

“Huh? What do you mean ‘disappear’?” Kimizuki asked as he looked around them. He could still hear screams even in the distance but the fog doesn’t seem to be disappearing yet.

“I-I’m not really sure but we have to get out of here and go somewhere safe.” Tomoe said as she grabbed the boys’ wrist and dragged them away from the school as she contemplated on where they should head onto.

“Tomo-nee… how about the secret base? It’s closer than our houses.” Kimizuki suggested

“I’m not sure if they’re still there but Shinoa and Mistuba went there earlier.”

“Oh, okay. Let’s go.” And they set off to the secret base while trying to avoid being separated by panicking individuals.

\--

“I thought there was gonna be a storm…” Mitsuba said as she looked outside of their base’s window “What the heck is up with this fog?!”

“I don’t know but I think it’s best we stay here.” Shinoa’s expression turned into that of worry as they heard screams in the distance “What’s going on out there?” She then looked over at Mitsuba whose clicking away at her phone “Micchan…”

“There’s no signal! I can’t contact anyone like this.” Mistuba complained as she walked around trying to get even one bar of signal “Aren’t Yoichi and Kimizuki about to go home from school? I hope they’re okay.”

\--

They were disappearing. No, specifically, they’re slowly being consumed by the fog, slowly ripping them bit by bit as they screamed. In the end, the victims disappear without a trace.

Mika and Akane watched in horror as the other kids slowly disappeared. Pulling the children who haven’t been affected by the strange phenomenon, they ran as fast as they could to the director’s office hoping to find adults that could help them but it was too late as even the director and his mother are gone. So he, together with 5 other kids ran outside hoping to find a safe place to hide. Akane repeatedly tries to calm the younger children down as they ran outside in the slowly dissipating fog while hearing the continuous screams of fear around them. The fog might be disappearing but not without taking anyone with it. They didn’t know where they’re headed but they knew they couldn’t stay here any longer. The wind picks up once again and trickles of rain suddenly fell from the sky. The threatening storm earlier is finally going to begin.

\--

As Tomoe ran alongside her brother and his friend, she noticed a group of crying children in the middle of the street being taken care of by 2 older kids who seem to be the same age as her brother. Worried about them, she called out. “Hey, are you guys alright?”

The oldest girl in the group looked up to her and said “Everyone’s gone and the other kids disappeared, too! We left the orphanage and we don’t know where we should go.” The girl explained, tears slowly forming in her eyes.

“Come with us then.” Tomoe suggested as she eyed the younger children who can’t be older than 10 “We don’t know if it’s actually safe there but we’re hoping it is.”

“Thank you.” The oldest boy in the group said as he and the girl earlier ushered the children to follow Tomoe’s group.

Yoichi was scared of what was happening but is happy that his sister still stopped to help those in need. As they ran, his hand was still holding his sisters’. As the fog was nearly over, they soon saw- in clear detail- how the people around them were ‘vanishing’. Yoichi had to avert his eyes and focus on where they were going. He looked over at his companions who were doing the same and Kimizuki was now carrying one of the little children while telling the kid to focus on him instead of the horrible things happening around them.

As they got near the park, two boys a bit older than them followed.

“Hey, where the heck are you going?” a purple haired boy asked

“We’ve got no time for your sh*t today, Lacus. Go away!” Kimizuki said without turning to look at the other boy

“No way! You guys seem to know where to go so we’re following you. Come on Rene!” Lacus said as he and his dark haired companion nodded at each other.

\--

Mistuba and Shinoa noticed the fog had nearly cleared up and they now contemplated leaving the safety of their base. “But it seems like the storm is really coming this time.” Mitsuba said as she looked at the sky from the window.

“Yeah, I guess we’d have to stay here for a while.”

Suddenly, there was a loud banging on the door “Please open up! It’s us, Shinoa-chan… Mitsuba-chan!”

The two girls recognized the voice belonging to their friend’s older sister. They immediately got up and opened the door. Slowly, their friends plus a few other children they didn’t know entered and after everyone has gone in, they closed the door.

“Who are they and what happened?” Shinoa asked as she looked at the others children who are obviously scared of something. Tomoe managed to explain what she and the others saw while her brother, Kimizuki and the two other older kids they met took care of the 4 little kids who are still shaken and one of them is still crying.

“Hey, don’t mess with those! They aren’t yours.” Kimizuki yelled at Lacus and Rene who are looking around the chest they had in their base.

Lacus dropped whatever he was holding back inside the chest “Okay, okay! Sheesh… so we’re all stuck here, huh?”

“Yeah, it’s already raining and it’s just gonna get worst. We might as well stay here for a while.” Mitsuba said as she walked over to the toy chest and closed it all the while glaring at the two boys so they won’t think of touching their belongings “So, who are the other kids?”

Akane placed a blanket on top of the children who they successfully put to bed and then stood up to face the others

“My name is Hyakuya Akane. Me and the others came from the orphanage. Thank you for helping us.” She then bowed

“I’m Mikaela Tepes. I used to be from the orphanage, too. Er, thanks for helping us. If it weren’t for you guys, we wouldn’t know where else we’d be going.” Mika bowed as well.

“Oh, I see. Well, I’m Saotome Tomoe and that…” she says pointing at her brother “--is my younger brother, Yoichi. It’s nice to meet you.” She bowed and her brother followed suit

The pink haired boy turned to them as well “Kimizuki Shihou.” He introduced himself

“Hi! I’m Hiiragi Shinoa and that tsundere over there is Micchan.” Shinoa grinned as she pointed to the twin-tailed girl

“What the hell, Shinoa?!” Mitsuba yelled at her friend “Don’t listen to her! My name is Sanguu Mitsuba and I’m not a tsundere.” Shinoa giggled as she heard

“I’m Lacus and that’s Rene!” they then stared at the other two boys at the back “Oi, blondie! You said your last name is ‘Tepes’, right? As in those rich guys living in the next town? I didn’t know they had a kid…”

“Uh, yeah… that one.” Mika answered “I was adopted 2 and ahalf years ago and moved abroad, so…”

They waited in the secret base and passed the time talking to each other or watching over the children. Kimizuki kept a look outside to see if the storm is going to stop. They didn’t have any food on them so staying there for more than a day is impossible. As moments passed, many of them fell asleep.

“Wake up!” Mika slowly opened his eyes to another young blonde shaking him awake “Mika-nii, wake up!”

Mika rubbed his eyes and yawned. He looked at the young boy in front of him “What’s wrong, Takumi?”

“Mika-nii, look! It’s not raining anymore.” Takumi pointed at the window.

Mika stood up and looked outside to check for himself. True enough, it wasn’t raining anymore although the sky is still covered with dark clouds. “You’re right. Guys, wake up! The raining stopped.”

The others awoke to Mika’s announcement and ran towards the window to check for themselves. The town was also quiet and they don’t hear any screaming anymore.

“We have to go out and check the town.” Kimizuki said as he walked over to the door “We can’t stay here forever so some of us have to leave and get help.”

“I’ll go with you!” Mika raised his hand “Akane, please stay here and watch the kids.”

“Me, too!” Shinoa stood up and walked towards Kimizuki

“I want to go as well.” Everyone turned to look at Yoichi who spoke up. His sister is clearly worried and was asking him not to leave “Don’t worry, sis. I- I want to help, too so please stay with the others.”

“Okay, so it’s just the 4 of us, then--“ before Kimizuki could continue, the young boy, Takumi ran up to then and grabbed on to Mika’s arm “I want to go, too.”

“But Takumi…” Mika wanted to reason with him but the boy didn’t budge

“I want to go with you. I want to see what happened at home.” Takumi looked down. Mika sighed and thought that he, too would like to see what happened to the orphanage so he finally agreed under the condition that he doesn’t go anywhere without them.

“Okay, it’s 5 people, then. We’re going and you idiots at the back!” Kimizuki yelled out to Lacus and Rene “Do something useful for once and take care of everyone or else.”

\--

They looked around as they walked. Many of the trees they passed by seem dead with their leaves gone and their barks black. There is still a bit of fog but only in the area with many trees and none on the road. As they got closer to the town, they saw that it was empty; there were pieces of debris almost everywhere due to the storm, puddles of water from the rain and no other person in site. It was like the town was abandoned.

“It’s like a ghost town out here…” Shinoa commented as they walked “So, where do we start?”

“We’ll walk around to see if there are any more survivors. Do you have reception?”

Shinoa took out her phone and checked “Still nothing.”

Kimizuki looked on ahead and said “Then we look for a payphone or try and get out of town to look for help.”

When they finally found a payphone near a convenience store, they immediately ran to it. Takumi volunteered to us the phone and seeing no harm in it, they gave him a few coins and a number to call. When he finally got inside the phone booth, the door suddenly closed on it’s own and no matter what they did to try to open it, it wouldn’t budge. Soon, their fears came true as Takumi started to scream.

“What’s going on? Takumi!” they called out. Blood started spraying everywhere inside the phone booth and soon, it was seeping out from the bottom of the door.

They felt helpless as the young boy screamed and couldn’t move from their spot. A few moments later when the door finally opened, they saw nothing but a huge amount of blood covering the almost the whole booth and Takumi is nowhere to be found.

“No way… why? Wha-- what happened?” Mika said, holding back tears and the urge to throw up like everyone else. They averted their eyes from the gruesome sight in front of them. It took them a while to move but when they finally did, Shinoa ran a few meters back and threw up instantly and Yoichi dropped to his knees and started to cry. Kimizuki walked over to Yoichi to calm him down and asked Shinoa if she were alright. Kimizuki looked back at the scene- he didn’t cry nor throw up but it was visible on his face that he too was affected.

Mika was still frozen on the spot. He had just met Takumi that morning but he already thought of the boy as a brother and felt responsible for what happened. He slowly made his way to the phone booth to check inside but he felt someone tug at his hand.

“Mika-kun, I know how you feel but it’s too dangerous!” Yoichi said in concern for the other boy.

Mika looked down and then looked back at him. “It’s fine, I won’t go in. I’ll just check.” He inspected the phone booth and saw nothing else strange aside from the blood that with no doubt belonged to his young friend and companion. He wiped the tears off his face as he knew crying wouldn’t help. “Let’s go. I-I don’t know what I can do but we have to find out what’s going on.”

“Sorry about Takumi.” Yoichi tells Mika as he looked back at the phone booth

“We’re gonna try and find out what’s going on in town. We won’t let this happen to the others. They’re counting on us.” Kimizuki said “Panicking won’t work right now. Let’s just hope the other towns aren’t affected by whatever this is…”

Shinoa looked around and said “We should look for a radio as well. We may hear news about other places.”

Before they left, Yoichi looked back at the phone booth. He wanted to throw up right then and there as he tried to imagine what might have happened to poor Takumi. He was going to turn around when he noticed something sparkle from inside the booth. He walked over to it and checked the pool of blood and noticed a necklace in the middle of it. He picked it up carefully and wiped it on the hem of his uniform. Before he could call out to them, he saw that they’re already walking ahead and decided to tell them later. Placing the necklace on his pant pocket, he ran off to join the others.

\--

They had reached the end of the town but saw nothing past the road ahead but heavy fog. Fearing that this would repeat the scenario from earlier that morning, they decided not to venture any further. Shinoa checked her phone once more but there was still no reception.

“We should go back and tell the others what happened.” Mika said sadly. He still couldn’t get his mind off what happened to Takumi. He’s also worried about how he’d tell Akane and the others.

“Okay, let’s go.” Kimizuki said as he looked back at his companions then his eyes widened at a sudden realization “Guys, where’s Yoichi?”

Shinoa and Mika looked around in confusion- Yoichi is nowhere to be found. “Wasn’t he just behind us?” Shinoa asked “He was definitely with us earlier.”

“Where could he have gone to? You think he went back on his own?” Mika asked the other two who just stared at each other.

“I highly doubt that. Yoichi isn’t the kind of guy who would ditch his friends.” Kimizuki said defensively. He had been friends with Yoichi, Shinoa and Mitsuba for years. They have their shortcomings and quirks but he knew they were all loyal to a fault.

“Well, we gotta look for him.” Mika suggested “I know it’s kind of dangerous but we should split up. He could be anywhere in town.”

“I agree. But we have to meet up again after a while.” Shinoa said “There might be no reception but our phone’s clocks still work, right?”

“Yeah, let’s meet again in… an hour? We should have checked a lot of places by then.” Kimizuki took out his phone and stared at the time- 10:30 am “We should meet up at the park after an hour and try to search for him together.”

The other two nodded and they all went their separate ways to search for their missing companion.

\--

The bloodied phone booth stood with its door still open. It was quiet and there was no other person in sight save for a young boy wearing a long sleeved red hoodie which looked a bit too big for him as his fingers are the only thing visible at the end of his sleeves and blue shorts that reached above his knees. His messy black hair is swaying in the wind and his green eyes stare at the blood at the floor of the phone booth with a look of disappointment. He steps away from the sidewalk and looked on the road ahead of him.


	2. CHAPTER 2- The Search

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The three kids split up to find their lost companion. They finally see what became of the town and the dangers that await them and one of them meets a mysterious child.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Splits into Shinoa, Kimizuki, and Mika's POV mostly. I suck at horror and battle scenes! Why'd I ever think I could pull this off? T^T
> 
> (I almost forgot Re: Kinder had a battle gameplay and the kids there got powers from their personalities. Since I dunno how to place them here, I put the OnS weapons in their owner's hand so they could fight).

Shinoa walked around in search for Yoichi. She tried calling out earlier to no avail and since their phones receive no signal, she couldn’t just call her friend either. She thought about where else the boy could be and the only place she could think of is his house. She ran as fast as she could to the direction of the Saotome Household.

\--

Kimizuki tried calling out for Yoichi in his search as well but nothing happened. As he walked around the empty neighbourhood, he heard a noise from inside one of the nearby houses- like something fell. He felt nervous instantly and his mind racing with many possibilities. Could it be another survivor or could it be something else entirely? Considering the strange events from this morning from how everyone else in town ‘disappeared’ and Takumi’s death, he couldn’t deny that there was something out there that’s causing it and that same something might just be the one making that noise.

Knowing that there’s a possibility that whatever made the noise is Yoichi, Kimizuki took a deep breath and went straight to the house. He twisted the door knob and luckily, it wasn’t locked. He ran his hands along the wall to look for a light switch. He finally felt the switch on his fingers and pressed it- the hallway light took a while to turn on but after a few seconds, the bulb suddenly exploded causing it’s pieces to scatter on the floor and sparks came out of whatever was left on the ceiling. Kimizuki quickly turned the light off before proceeding. Taking his phone out of his pocket, he turned on it’s flashlight as he made his way past the broken shards.

He shone his light around- bottles and cans of beer placed on some sides of the house and on the bottom steps of the stairs and newspapers on the floor. It like nobody tried cleaning after themselves. As he walked, he felt the strange sensation of being watched. He looked around for any signs of life but found none. It was quiet and the only sounds he can hear are the faint sound of the blowing wind outside and his own footsteps.

He looked around and saw the door to the living room ajar. He opened it and observed his surrounding first before stepping in. The room seemed normal- sofas in the middle of the room, a television set placed in the middle past of a shelf and a small potted plant adorned the window but like outside, there were pieces of trash here and there. Walking closely to the shelf, Kimizuki noticed a broken picture frame. On the photo is a family- a mother, a father and a young boy.

‘Thud’

Another noise. This time, it sounded like it came from upstairs. Kimizuki immediately went outside the room he was in and slowly but carefully climbed the stairs. It was dark in the hallway of the 2nd floor but not as dark as it was below for there were windows on his left. From there, he could see the back of the house. He walked over to the 1st room he saw. The door wasn’t locked either just like the front door. Going inside, he saw a small bed, toys strewn on the floor and pieces of children’s clothing- all signs that it was a kid’s room. Looking carefully, he noticed that many of the toys are already broken, the table lamp is broken and on the floor as well.

The closet at the far left corner of the room is slightly open. When he looked closely, something was dripping out of the closet- some sort of red liquid “Is- is that blood?” he asked himself.

Slowly, he walked towards the closet while trying to avoid stepping on any of the toys on the floor. He extended his hand and slowly gripped the closet’s handle. He felt hesitation and fear but also curiosity. He gulped, looked away and pulled on the handle. He heard a ‘thud’ and when he looked at the floor in front of him, something had fallen from the closet. Covered in blood and decaying with maggots crawling all around it- there was no mistaking it, it was a severed human head. And it’s glassy eyes are staring right at him and it’s mouth is open as if it’s screaming.

He stepped back as far as he could and ended up falling on the bed. He wanted to gag right there because of the image and the terrible smell. What could’ve happened and who could have done this? He froze on the spot- could whatever have done this still be inside the house with him?

He immediately got up and looked around, covering his nose with a hand. He didn’t see nor sense anyone else with him. He looked back at the closet and saw a bit in the darkness if its inside is the rest of the man’s dead body equally rotting. He flinches and in the corner of his eye, he saw it- stuck deep inside the mouth of the man’s severed head is what looks like a card of some sort. He grabbed the nearest piece of cloth he could find and used it to grab whatever it was off of the corpse. After he pulled it out, he used the cleaner part of the same cloth to wipe of the blood and the maggots off the card. He threw the cloth away and discovered it was a white, laminated card. There was nothing on the front except a black rectangular box and intricate designs on it’s side like something was supposed to be in the middle of it and below was a placeholder for a name as well.

He heard footsteps and suddenly in a flash, he saw someone running past the door of the room he was in. He didn’t see it properly but it seemed to be a child- or someone with the height of one. He placed the card in his uniform’s front pocket and ran outside the door.

\--

Mika stopped to catch his breath. He’d been running around his side of town in search for Yoichi while calling out the other boy’s name. He sat on the road while hugging his knees. He wanted to cry.

Everyone else started disappearing in a gruesome and strange manner, Takumi is dead and now someone else goes missing. He felt confused and helpless but he knew he should stay strong for those that still needed him. Thinking of his younger ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ left behind at the secret base and his new companions, he gets up, slaps his face with both hands and wipes the tears forming in his eyes.

“This is no time for thinking about giving up!” he shakes his head and walked on forward.

He walked a few miles to no avail. Still no sign of Yoichi in sight however as turned a corner, he saw someone sitting absentmindedly on the sidewalk. He quickly ran up to the other person. When he got close, he saw that it was a child around his age wearing a red hoodie and shorts. The boy had messy black hair and when they boy turned to look at him, he saw green eyes. The boy looked at Mika with disinterest.

“Uh, hi? I didn’t think I’d see anyone else around here.”

The boy stared at him for a few more moments before he spoke “Yeah…”

Mika was at a loss. The other kid didn’t seem to want to talk at all “Anyways, what are you doing here? Are you alone? I was with some other kids earlier but one of us suddenly went missing so we split up to look for him. You didn’t happen to see anyone else around did you?”

The dark haired boy got up and faced him and shook his head “I haven’t seen anyone else. I’ve been walking alone for a while now.” That’s when Mika noticed that the boy is a few inches shorter than him.

“I see.” Mika sighed, still no leads to his missing companion “That’s too bad.”

“Well, if that’s all, I have to go.” The boy then started walking away to the direction where Mika came from.

“Eh? W-wait up!” Mika grabbed the other boy’s shoulder which made him stop “You’re alone, right? It’s dangerous to go by yourself. You should come with me, instead.”

The boy sighed “Why should I? I don’t even know you.”

“Okay! Well for starters, my name is Mikaela. You can just call me ‘Mika’.” Mika smiled and extended his hand “What’s your name?”

The other boy quickly turns around to face him, eyes wide and is staring at him in disbelief. The dark-haired boy contemplates for a bit before offering his hand for the handshake which Mika quickly grabs “Yuuichirou. Everyone just calls me Yuu…” he introduces himself then looks away.

“Great! Now we know each other’s name at least. You’re gonna come with me now, aren’t you?” Yuu nods and Mika lets go of his hand and turns around to look in the opposite direction “Alright! Let’s get going Yuu-kun! We’ll try to find Yoichi as we walk back to where everyone else is waiting. We have to meet in an hour and it’s getting late.”

When Mika started to walk away, Yuu grabs his right hand with his left loosely. Mika looks back at him and asks “What’s wrong, Yuu-kun?”

Yuu blushes and with his finger scratching his cheek, looks to his right and told the other “Yuu-chan…”

“Huh?” Mika’s face turned red. Did he hear the other boy right?

“Call me ‘Yuu-chan’.” Yuu tells him with all seriousness, his blush never leaving his face. Confused as to why a kid he just met wanted to be called in a nickname (and using the honorific ‘-chan’ at that), Mika stared at Yuu for a moment and thought that maybe there’s no harm in doing what was asked of him. It’s just a nickname after all.

“Oh, okay then. I’ll just call you, ‘Yuu-chan’.” After saying the other boy’s name, it’s Mika’s turn to go wide-eyed. Blurry images of a bench, a bloody handkerchief and a hand in his flooded his mind but no matter how much he tried to think about it, he couldn’t remember what they meant.

“Are you okay?” Yuu asks which put Mika out of his trance. The blonde quickly shook his head and tells him that everything was fine and they went on their way. Yuu followed Mika with his hand still holding onto the others and Mika holds on it tight.

\--

Shinoa stood at the front of the house that belonged to the Saotome family. It was a small house with 2 floors. The walls are painted white with a red roof and the door painted blue and the front yard had a garden, a big tree and the brown wooden gate was left open. She rang the doorbell hoping that if Yoichi was inside, he’d hear it but she knocked and called out nonetheless “Yoichi-san! Are you in there?”

There was no answer and she was getting anxious. If not here, where else could her friend have gone? She stepped away from the door and looked around and she saw the curtain on one of the upstairs window move. “ _Is someone up there?_ ” she thought.

She ran to the door and opened it. It wasn’t locked so she let herself in. She turned the lights on in every room in the 1st floor as she searched. The house was empty and Yoichi wasn’t anywhere. She then decided that it was time to search upstairs. The 2nd floor had 3 rooms- one for Yoichi, one for his sister, and a master bedroom for their parents. Shinoa decided to check the 1st room which happens to be Yoichi’s.

Inside, Yoichi’s bed was made, his books are on his study table and nothing was out of place. She checked the closets and looked under the bed but found nothing. She went out, closed the door and went to the next room which belongs to Tomoe. It was the same with Yoichi’s room and checking every potential hiding place, she came up empty-handed. Last room was Yoichi’s parent’s room.

The room was darker than the other two’s probably because their curtains are thicker and darker than the one’s in their children’s room. There was a huge bed on one side and across it is a shelf with a television on top and some dvd on the smaller shelves on the bottom and on one side was a dvd player. The room looked clean and nothing amiss. Shinoa checked the closet and found nothing but clothes. She was going to check under the bed next but a something suddenly startled her- the sound of static and bright light behind her. She turned around to see the tv turned on but there was nothing but static on it’s screen. She looked around but there wasn’t anyone else there and the door is still closed. She walked towards it slowly with her finger hovering above the on/off button. Before she could press it, faint images started to appear on the screen amidst the continuous static.

She could see a face. It wasn’t clear but she could make out the eyes, nose and mouth. One thing she noticed was the pair of eyes, they were blood red and she could swear they were staring right at her through the screen. Soon, she started hearing a voice. Listening closely, she found out they were coming from the tv.

“Ki-… every- … all of…” *static*”Dead… want them dead…”

Her heart started beating faster as she listened. She watched the figure on the screen staring at her, it’s mouth not moving but a voice could be heard repeating the words ‘kill’ and ‘dead’. She stood there not knowing what to do then, the person on the screen’s mouth opens, uttering words that sound clearer that you can’t hear the static anymore.

“It seems you’re still alive, though…”

She backed away. She knew it was talking to her. She was going to run when her leg was pulled by something from underneath the bed. She looked behind to see a dark sharp clawed hand pulling her towards the bed. She tried to kick it away but it wouldn’t budge. She screamed and dug her nails to the carpeted floor as she was being dragged then she remembered something- she had a nail file on her pocket. She took it out, propped herself up and stabbed the hand as hard as she could making it bleed and loosening it’s grip. She took the chance, got up and ran out the door as fast as she could. She closed the door immediately and saw something dark, like smoke, seeping out from underneath.

She ran as fast as she could and the smoke followed soon engulfing whatever was behind her in darkness. She nearly tripped as she ran on the stairs but she held onto the railings for support. When she got outside, she shut the door behind her and stepped back, seeing if the smoke would follow her out. A bit of the darkness seeped out of the door but didn’t go any farther. It was pulled back inside but not before leaving something near the foot of the door.

The young girl carefully walked towards it. Fearing that it might be some sort of trap, she grabbed a loose branch nearby to pull the item closer to her and away from the door. When she deemed it was safe, she picked it up and examined it. It was a tiny, black metal rod with a strange design on the top end.

She kept it on her skirt pocket, hoping it would be helpful later on. Looking back one last time at the house, Shinoa left and made her way back to the park.

\--

“Yoichi!” Mika shouted hoping that the other boy could hear him and come out from wherever he was. He sighed and looked around with worry. He still hadn’t found Yoichi and no clue about the other boy’s whereabouts nor about their strange situation.

“Who is this ‘Yoichi’? Is he your friend?” Yuu asked

Mika looked behind him for a bit and said “Uh, not exactly. We just met today and his sister helped us earlier and that’s why we’re still here.”

“Okay. Where’d you last see him?”

“It was…” Mika then remembered what happened at the phone booth “We were walking around town trying to find out what’s going on and then stuff happened and when we turned around, he was gone. We didn’t even notice.”

“I see, so where do we go? I was walking around this area earlier but there was nobody around.”

“Oh. By the way…” Mika stopped walking and turned around to face Yuu “How did you survive the fog earlier? We hid somewhere a bit far from town so it didn’t get to us but you weren’t there so…”

“I don’t know. I was at home, in my room. I heard screaming outside so I stayed in my room the whole time. Then there was a storm.” Yuu paused for a bit “And then when it was over, I went outside to see what was going on and found no one. I just started walking around after that.”

“Really? So the fog didn’t get inside your house at all?” Mika asked the other because he didn’t know if he’d fully believe what the other kid was saying- the fog didn’t just affect the outside; they were hit inside the orphanage, too.

“Yeah…” Yuu glared at him and let go of his hand “You… you think I’m lying, don’t you?”

“Well, it’s not like that! I mean… it’s just.” he sighed and took Yuu’s hand and squeezed it “I’m sorry. I’m just really, really confused right now with almost everyone I knew gone and Takumi dying and Yoichi’s missing and… I didn’t mean to suspect you.”

“It’s okay, I get it.” Yuu squeezed back his hand with Mika’s “Let’s just go.”

The rest of their walk back to the park was spent in silence. Yuu might have forgiven him but the guilt is still eating him on the inside. He was on the same boat as the other boy- scared and confused and instead of sympathizing, he thought badly of the other instead. He wanted to apologize again but didn’t know how to break the silence.

“Umm…” Yuu spoke up “I was just wondering and sorry for asking but earlier you mentioned someone named ‘Takumi’. Who is he?”

“He’s… he’s my brother. He died earlier and I don’t know how exactly.” Mika explained while trying to stop himself from crying in front of his new companion

“I’m sorry about your brother.”

“No, it’s fine. We just met today, too actually. We’re not really siblings.” Mika wiped the tears off his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket “I used to live in the orphanage when I was younger and me and the other kids there treated each other like siblings so even when I got adopted two and a half years ago, I kept in touch with them and continued to think of the kids there, even the new ones, as my brothers and sisters. I just got back to this country yesterday so I just met the new kids today.”

“That sounds nice. It must be fun having siblings.”

“It is. I was the only child of my real parents and the woman who adopted me didn’t have other kids so I’m happy that I have a family back at the orphanage, too. Many of them along with the director and my mom disappeared in the fog earlier and then Takumi is also... Akane and three more kids are still here though and I’m not gonna let anything happen to them.”

“You’re a nice guy aren’t you?” Yuu said with a sad smile and muttered under his breath “ _Like a white knight._ ”

“Huh? What was that, Yuu-chan?”

“Nothing.”

\--

Kimizuki, using his phone as a flashlight once again, searched the living room once more and then the kitchen. He thought of going outside and giving up when he noticed a door underneath the stairs. He opened it and saw that it was the path to the basement. He pulled the light switch hoping that this one won’t explode like the one outside. It took a few seconds but it lit up and he waited and luckily, it stayed on and nothing happened.

He gradually made his way down to the basement and looked for another light switch. He shone his light around and walked past a few metal shelves filled with random items until he found what he was looking for. He flipped the switch and turned off his phone. When he put it back in his pocket, he felt something wet fall on his cheeks. He wiped it off with the back of his hand and saw blood. When he looked up, trails of blood are spreading on the ceiling and looking back to where it was coming from at the edge of the room, he saw a huge dark hole eating away at the wall turning everything it touches into blood and it’s slowly spreading throughout the whole basement.

Something was coming out from inside the hole. Crawling slowly on all fours, covered in blood with it’s mouth open in a wide grin showing sharp teeth is a monster-like creature with long black hair red slitted-eyes and human-like body with long fingers and sharp nails. When half of it was already out of the hole, huge black wings spread out of it’s back. It growls as it looks at him with hungry eyes.

He could do nothing but stare for a while, thinking if he should break for a run while it’s still from him but he fears it might attack if he moves even a bit. He then looks to his sides to find anything resembling a weapon or close enough to actually make damage if he uses it.

_“Show me… what you can do.”_

He hears a strange voice in his head and he instinctively reached out to the card on his pocket. Pulling it out, an image of a green-haired child with horns and tail slowly began to appear on the inside of the card and a name was written at the bottom:

“Kiseki- O…”

In a flash, the creature in front of him leapt. He put his arms in front of him to try and defend himself and when he didn’t feel any pain from the attack, he looked in front of him and saw that he held each of his hands two similar swords connected together. The creature is still in mid-air being repelled by the swords.

“What the--? Where did these come from?” he asked as he pushed away the creature. It fell back a few feet from him but there was no damage to its body save for its face which collided with the swords earlier. Knowing it was no time to ask any questions, he held his battle stance and didn’t take his eyes off his enemy. Overflowing with renewed determination now that he had a way to fight back, the swords he held emanated a strange black cloud-like aura around it. When the creature leapt up one more time to attack him directly, he dodged to his left slashed the oncoming creature on it’s left side leaving it injured when it hit the floor. It’s injury is not only bleeding but the sides of the wound is bubbling with some kind of black acid.

It took a while before the creature got up once more. It leapt up to the wall and then used it to jump at Kimizuki from another angle. Not letting the enemy out if sight, Kimizuki was able to dodge and slash his attacker who then started attacking faster and faster in a frantic attempt at killing him. Deciding that killing it is for the best before it gets outside the house, Kimizuki readies himself again for battle and this time, he’s determined to kill it.

\--

Mika and Yuu were getting close to the park. From where they were, they could see two figures coming in from different directions. As they all came closer, Mika recognized the other two as Shinoa and Kimizuki but other than that, there was still no Yoichi in sight. Not letting go of Yuu’s hand, he ran towards the other two who were doing the same, with him dragging Yuu along with him.

“You haven’t found Yoichi, I take it?” Shinoa asked the boys who shook their heads “I see. I went to his house but he wasn’t there. There was however, something strange. Some kind of, I don’t know… demon? It tried to attack me but I was able to get away.”

“Same with me.” Kimizuki replied, adjusting his glasses by pushing the bridge with his finger “I heard a noise from one of the houses and checked. Not only was there some kind of creature there that attacked me but I saw a corpse.”

“Corpse? But everyone who disappeared completely in the fog right? Or was it like…” Shinoa didn’t know if she should continue. Both she and Kimizuki looked at Mikaela. The three of them understood what she meant anyways.

“I’m not sure but his head was torn off his body and strangely enough, though the blood seemed fresh, the body itself is already rotting and there were maggots all over it, too.” Kimizuki face had turn to that of annoyance “Tch. I could only guess that whatever creature I found on the basement was the one who did it.”

“That’s strange though…” Mika thought “Does that mean there were other survivors who died after the storm ended?”

“Maybe…” Shinoa answered. She and Kimizuki then looked behind the blonde and wonder who the dark haired boy was. Before they could ask however, Mika noticed what they were looking at and explained.

“Oh, guys.” Mika pulled Yuu over closer to where they stand “This is Yuu! I met him while I was searching for Yoichi. He was alone so I thought I’d take him with us!” he then nudged Yuu asking him to introduce himself

“I’m Yuuichirou but everyone just calls me ‘Yuu’. Nice to meet you both.” Yuu bowed and the other two did the same

“Oh, I see. My name is Hiiragi Shinoa but you can just call me ‘Shinoa’. It’s nice to meet you, Yuu-san!”

“I’m Kimizuki Shihou.”

“I didn’t think anyone else survived the fog earlier. How did you escape it?” Shinoa asked the dark haired boy

“I was in my room when all of the weird stuff was happening so I didn’t really see what this ‘fog’ is. Whn I went out, it was quiet and I couldn’t find anybody.” “Well, that’s enough introductions. We should go back to the secret base and see if Yoichi came back.”

\--

Akane and the others spent their time waiting asleep. The two boys left with them took a nap on the chairs while she and the kids shared the bed and Mitsuba slept sitting near bed with her back to one of the bed post. When she awoke, she noticed that someone was missing.

“Huh?” she looked around “Where’s Tomoe-san?”

Not wanting to wake the younger children, she walked over to the boys quietly and shook one of them gently “Excuse me but do you know where Tomoe-san went?”

The purple haired boy opened his eyes and yawned. He looked around him as well and answered “Saotome’s sister? No, I didn’t notice if she left. She was still here before I fell asleep.”

Mistuba opened her eyes and saw the worried Akane talking to Lacus. She got up to stretch her body and walked up to the two to talk “What’s going on?”

“Oh, Mistuba-san! Have you seen Tomoe-san?” Akane asked the other girl who just looked around

“Huh no… I thought she was asleep. Could she have gone outside?”

Suddenly they heard a knock on the door and so Akane went to open it. She was greeted by the worried faces of Shinoa, Kimizuki and Mika and behind them is a boy she doesn’t recognize.

“Is Yoichi back, yet?” Kimizuki worriedly asked

“No. I thought he was with you guys.” Akane answered

Mistuba ran up to them and exclaimed “Tomoe-nee-san is missing!”

“Even Tomo-nee? Since when?” Shinoa asked as she made her way inside to confirm what was told of her

“I don’t know. We all fell asleep after a while and when we woke up, we couldn’t find her!” Akane explained Kimizuki immediately went up to the other two boys at the back to ask questions. Shinoa and Mitsuba went outside to check if Tomoe was around and Mika talked to Akane.

“Yoichi went missing, too?” Akane asked “And Mika, where’s Takumi?”

Mika looked at her filled with guilt. Akane saw through this and feared the worse. She asked him once again “What happened to Takumi?”

“I’m sorry, Akane. I couldn’t save him.” With those words said, Mika couldn’t stop the tears from falling any longer and his sister started crying as well “We didn’t know it would happen. If only I…”

Akane hugged her brother as the two of them cried. Shinoa then explained to everyone what happened from when they left to the time they got back, with one of the other two speaking up from time to time to tell of what happened to them in their separation. Mitsuba also told them of when she left for a while earlier earning her worried complaints from her comrades. The younger children had awakened from their sleep and hurriedly ran towards Mika when they saw him asking him what happened. Mika and Akane wiped their tears away as Akane slowly broke the news to them.

Akane and the others tried to calm the children when they started to cry. Mika still couldn’t look them in the eye after what happened as he still blamed himself. He then felt someone squeeze his hand and when he turned to look saw Yuu who was looking at him with worry. Needing support at the moment, Mika suddenly hugged Yuu and silently cried on the other boy’s shoulder while Yuu hugged him back. Yuu rubbed Mika’s back with his right hand and his left holding onto the back of the blonde’s head.

It took a while before they all calmed down. They had stopped crying but are still shaken and bothered by everything. Shinoa was the 1st to speak “I know everything has been hard up til now but we can’t stay here like this. Two of our friends are still missing and we have to go look for them!”

Wiping their tears away, everyone nodded in agreement and Shinoa continued “This place seems to still be safe for the moment. After what happened to Takumi earlier, it’s safer to leave the little kids here so Akane-chan, please stay here with them while the rest of us continue our search.”

“Alright.” Akane then looked at the dark haired boy standing close to Mika “By the way, I don’t believe we’ve been introduced yet.”

“Yeah, who’s this?” Mitsuba asked as she eyed the new boy

“Oh, everyone.” Mika spoke “This is Yuuichirou! I met him while in search for Yoichi earlier.”

“Nice to meet you. You can just call me ‘Yuu’.” he spoke in a deadpan voice

“I’m Sanguu Mitsuba, it’s nice to meet you as well.” The twin tailed girl said “And those idiots at the back are Lacus and Rene.”

“Yuu-chan, this is my sister Akane.” Mika pulled Yuu over to Akane and then turned to look at his sister

“It’s nice to meet you, Yuu! Thanks for keeping Mika company earlier.” Akane shook hands with the boy

“Alright, we should really go now! It’s gonna be afternoon soon and it wouldn’t be easy to look for Yoichi and his sister in the dark. Let’s go!” and with Kimizuki’s words, the rest of the children save for Akane and the other orphans, left the secret base and went to town.

“We should split up but in groups. After the attacks earlier, it’s best if we have a group to rely on. We’d be back here before dark whether or not we find them.” Shinoa said as she looked at everyone

“Okay. So how do we pick groups?” Mitsuba asked with her right hand halfway raised

“We only need to groups and since there are…” Shinoa started a mental head count “7 of us, one group will have 4 people and one will have 3.”

“Then it’ll be you,” Kimizuki points out to Shinoa, then himself “me, Mistuba and Mika. You three do whatever.” He then points out to Lacus, Rene and Yuu.

“Okay, whate--” Lacus was cut off by what Yuu did next.

Yuu glared at the taller boy and quickly stood beside Mika and held the blonde’s hand “No.”

“What?” Kimizuki asked in annoyance and confusion. The others just stared at the current scenario before them. Mika blushed as he stared at the hand that now held his “You have a problem with what I said?”

“Yeah. Who the hell do you think you are giving me orders?” Yuu spoke with anger and defiance “I go where Mika goes.”

“Yuu-chan…” before Mika could say anything, Kimizuki shouted

“And how about you? Look, I don’t exactly trust you. Sure, we have just met Mika today but he’s proven himself trustworthy enough to go with us. You on the other hand…” this time, it was his turn to glare at Yuu “You just appeared out of nowhere. I don’t buy your ‘I was at home’ story. Almost everyone disappeared earlier because of the fog and those we saw here that didn’t are corpses. I don’t care what you and Mika have but I don’t want you around.”

Kimizuki stepped in front of Yuu who was still taking his stand right next to Mika, grabbing onto the collar of the smaller boy’s clothes. They glared at each other and were about to break into a fight when the girls ran up to Kimizuki to hold him back while the other two boys and Mikaela pulled Yuu back. “This isn’t the time for this!” Shinoa complained as she pulled Kimizuki back

Mika pulled his hand out of Yuu’s tight grip to face him “Yuu-chan, can’t you just go with them instead? Why would you want to go with me?”

Yuu’s face became that of annoyance and disappointment. Like he couldn’t believe Mika just asked him those questions. He looked away and without saying anything more, started walking away.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Kimizuki yelled. Yuu didn’t even attempt to look back and continued walking back to the direction of the area where he had 1st encountered Mika.

Mika chased after him and asked “Yuu-chan, wait! Where are you going?”

“Just leave me alone!” Yuu looked at him, glaring but Mika noticed that there were tears in his eyes. He quickly took Yuu’s hand and pulled him closer

“Don’t leave! I don’t understand what’s going on but it’s dangerous for us to be alone here right now. Please stay.”

“Just leave him, Mika!” Kimizuki shouted as he got himself out of the girl’s grips on him “We don’t need him.”

“Kimizuki!”

“Guys!”

Before anyone else could protest, they all heard a loud crash. Looking at the direction where it came from, they saw a smoke coming from the school as broken pieces of glass and concrete fell from one of the 5th floor classrooms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to the people that left kudos and a comment on the 1st chapter. This is the 1st time people did that. I get like, one or two likes at most and no comment (except from my friends whom I asked) so somehow this made me happy. :)
> 
> Thanks to those who read this far without puking at my horrible attempt at horror. XD


	3. CHAPTER  3- Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yoichi finds himself trapped in school and Mitsuba gets herself in a pinch when she decides to venture outside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yoichi and Mitsuba gets a chapter for themselves (separately, of course). This chapter was a pain to write so it'll probably be a pain to read. I'm Sorry. The whole thing might sound like a descriptive walkthrough for a game. OTL
> 
> Oh and I haven't mentioned this but since I didn't know much about Yoichi's sister besides her sacrificing herself for him in the anime, I just made her into a nice big sister-like person to everyone else as well.

_-Two hours earlier-_

Yoichi looked around in utter confusion. Gray walls and closed windows in a long hallway- he was at school. He doesn’t know how or why he was there as the last thing he remembered was what happened at the telephone booth and him catching up to his friends. He ran past several classrooms and the shoe lockers to get to the main entrance. He tried opening the doors but they wouldn’t budge at all as if the whole door was part of the wall itself. He ran back to the hallway and tried the windows but they were tight shut. He looked for a window he could open from any of the room in the 1st floor but all the same, they were locked.

Having no choice but to look for any other possible escape routes, Yoichi headed for the stairs.

It was the same in the 2nd floor except there are classrooms which are locked and couldn’t be opened. He checked the fire exits as well but no luck. Feeling desperate, he grabbed one of the chairs inside the classroom he was currently in and (nervously) attempted to break a window. When the chair hit the glass, it just bounced back. He blinked once and tried again but the glass didn’t even have one scratch on it. He put the chair down and sat on his knees.

“What am I gonna do? I have to get out of here…”

His body suddenly tensed as he heard footsteps. He slowly got up and began to walk out of the classroom. Looking both ways, he didn’t see anyone else around so he just randomly chose a destination and headed to the stairs on the left side. As he was getting up the 2nd set of stairs to the 3rd floor, he saw someone turn the corner.

He was nervous but ran ahead, hoping to see who it was thinking that if it was someone dangerous, he’d just run downstairs as fast as he could. Checking the 3rd floor hallway, he saw no one so he decided to check the classrooms. Again, they’re unsurprisingly empty making him think that maybe the person earlier was just an illusion. Remembering that the faculty room was at the 3rd floor, he decided to check the place hoping there would be at least a key that could open any of the other doors.

The faculty room was devoid of people as well. He was having second thoughts on looking around the faculty room and raiding the teachers’ stuff but he doesn’t have a choice. He checked the desk nearest to the door 1st and found a couple of record books, school papers and (he had to avert his eyes on this one) test papers that they would be given for the exams next week. He tried pulling on the drawers but they were all locked.

The next few desks were the same as the first one albeit there are differences in some of the items he found. He also found family pictures and student records. He was about to give up when he was able to open one of the drawers from the last table he tried looking into. Inside it are more papers, pencils, an eraser, some tacks inside a small transparent box, and (luckily) a key. It was on a cute little bear keychain which he thought was strange- the desk he got it from belongs to a male teacher on his late twenties and they didn’t seem to be car keys either. Either way, he just shrugged and tried using the key on the other desks.

Having no luck, he tried the lockers belonging to the teachers but nothing happened. Giving up on this one, Yoichi heads out of the room and headed back to the shoe lockers in hopes that one of them would be the correct place. It might not be an exit but it’s the only clue he’s got.

Trying the last of the shoe lockers with no success, Yoichi sat on the floor and rested his back on the lockers. He was tired from all the running and rummaging around the place. Taking out his phone from his pocket, he checked if there was any reception but so far, still none. Looking at the time, he realized he’d been locked up in school for almost an hour.

“They’re probably worried about me now.” He sighed “How the heck did I end up here?”

After a few minutes of rest, Yoichi stood up again, walking towards the hallway thinking of where he should try the key next. He walked around while thinking “Where else would there be any locks that would fit this key?”. When he got to the stairs at the end of the hall, he saw it: beneath the stairs is a door leading to the school basement. The place was creepy and just thinking about venturing the area disturbed him but he remembered that old lockers were stored in there along with random junk.

He stepped into the dark area in the corner of the stairs, standing in front of the basement door. He was nervous and scary thoughts started running through his head. He remembered all those stories the other kids say about the alleged ghosts in the school basement (with the place being part of their school’s local “Seven Mysteries”). He twisted the doorknob and pushed open the door, looking in the dim lit stairs to the underground in front of him. He checked his phone for a moment and saw that it doesn’t have much batteries anymore- with 3 bars out of 5.

“Hmm… this isn’t good. I could use the phone’s flashlight but I might run out of batteries. What if there’s an emergency?” Yoichi closed the door in front of him and made his way to the faculty room in the 3rd floor hoping to find an actual flashlight he could use.

Once again rummaging through the teacher’s tables, he tried looking for anything else that might help but none so far. Beginning to feel desperate (as he feared that he might be stuck here for the rest of the day and he didn’t want to spend the night alone in the empty school building), he tried the lockers again and surprisingly, this time, one of them actually opened up.

Inside, he found a box. It wasn’t sealed so he took it out and looked into it- adult magazines, manga, toys, phones and random items that he guessed were confiscated from the students. He took them out one by one and at the bottom of the box, he found a small shiny metal item on a keychain. Upon close inspection, it was a swiss army knife. He shoves it onto his pocket just in case. Sadly, there was no flashlight inside. He placed the items properly inside (in contrast to the mess he found it in earlier) and returned it to the locker.

Standing outside the faculty room, Yoichi started thinking of his next move- he didn’t have a phone charger and he doesn’t even know if he’d make it out here today but if he couldn’t find a flashlight, he would be forced to use his phone (whose battery runs out easily). He thought of checking the 4th floor but the only other rooms there besides a couple of classrooms are the Principal’s Office (which he assumes is locked) and the Student Council office (probably locked as well). He decided to check anyways, hoping that one of the two aforementioned rooms is miraculously unlocked and that same room had a flashlight.

Once he got to the 4th floor, he decided to look out of the window. The sky was still cloudy and gray and the leaves are still swaying telling him that the wind is still blowing outside. He quickly ran towards the door to the Principal‘s office. He pulled the door but it didn’t open. He tried the same with the Student Council room but it’s locked just the same. He sighed in defeat and sat down with his back to the door as he stared at the window. “What do I do now?”

\--

Meanwhile at the secret base, Akane had just been able to get the little ones to sleep. They were crying earlier saying they wanted to go back home and were scared. It took a lot of talking to from the three girls to get them to stop crying and eventually, they got tired and went to bed.

“I’m hungry!” Lacus complained as he looked through his bag “Darn it! I forgot my lunch back home.”

“So did I.” Rene said without looking through his bag

“What do we do? We don’t have any food or water at all.” Akane said “We’d get hungry later. I wonder if the others found help or at least something to eat.”

“There are some stores a few blocks past the park so I’m sure they’d get something to eat.” Tomoe said calmly “I’m sure everything would be fine.”

“About water though…” Mistuba joined in “There is a vending machine at the park. Maybe we could get something to drink there?”

“But the outside is--” Akane said, worried. They were told not to go outside just like that. It could still be dangerous.

“It’s fine, I’d go.” Mitsuba pointed a finger to herself “You guys stay here.”

“But it’s dangerous! I’ll go instead.” Tomoe stood up, grabbing her pink jacket lying on the floor she was sitting on earlier

“No! Please stay here, Tomoe-nee-san. They need you here.” Mitsuba told the older girl as they both stared at Akane and the children. Tomoe finally agreed after a while and watched as the blonde girl went to the door “I promise I’d be back.”

The wind was chilly outside. Mitsuba shuddered as she walked down the path towards the park. Looking around, she saw debris almost everywhere from the storm and puddles of water. The place looked lonely and empty without other people. She hoped this didn’t affect other towns as she worried about their families living outside of the area.

The wind made the swings go back and forth by itself making squeaking noises. Apart from those and her own footsteps, it was eerily quiet. She spotted the vending machine and quickly checked her wallet and pockets for money. She made her way to the machine and looked at the choices of drinks she could buy.

“Crap! I forgot to take a bag. How do I carry this many drinks by myself?” she said mentally cursing herself for forgetting. She put buying drinks aside for a while until she finds something to carry them on.

She walked around, hoping somebody left a bag or even finding a (clean) plastic bag lying around but no such luck. She then went over to the nearest house hoping she could find something at least while keeping an eye out as she walked down the street. The house’s gate was not locked as she let herself in and searched the outside. The front yard was dirty with all the stray leaves, branched and mud. She went to the side of the house and saw a bunch of children’s toys scattered around and luckily, a cute pink basket with a bow on the handle. It had toys in it as well. She emptied the basket of it’s contents and took it promising that she’d return it after she had used it.

She ran out of the gate and onto the street, hurrying back to the park so she could buy their drinks and get back to the safety of the base. As she ran closer to the park, she felt the odd sensation of someone watching her. She stopped in her tracks and looked around. She saw something pass by another side of the street. She placed the basket down and ran after it.

Before Mitsuba realized it, she’d been cornered. A black figure is blocking the only way out of the dead end and is coming closer. She looked at the ground but the only thing she found are a bunch of sticks and a few rocks. She knew she had no fighting chance without a weapon and the things at her feet aren’t really enough for a battle but she picked them up anyways, feeling the ground and holding onto the rocks she could get her hands on without looking away from the enemy in front of her. She shoves many of them onto her empty pocket and threw one at the creature in front of her. It hit but the creature was unfazed as it kept going to her direction.

She took a deep breath and took a few steps back. As the black figure got closer, she readied herself so she could escape. When it was close enough it suddenly tried to hit her with it’s arms. Mitsuba dodges and runs past the creature who started chasing after her. She needed a place to hide and fast.

She had no idea where she was going and the creature is still trailing behind her. She soon found herself back at the road near the park and from the corner of her eye she noticed one of the house’s with a locked gate slowly swung open. She ran towards the house and locked the door behind her as soon as she could. She didn’t bother on opening any lights and went straight to the last door on the hallway which she finds out after getting in is the bathroom, closing the door behind her afterwards. She could hear the creature opening the front door. With the place being dark, she hid in the only place she thought she could possibly hide- the clothes hamper on her left filled with tons of dirty clothes.

It was stinky and hot- too uncomfortable for her own liking and not to mention it’s dark underneath the pile of clothing she was in. She doesn’t see what’s happening outside but she could at least still hear a bit of what’s happening to her surroundings with the town being dead quiet and all. She started hearing footsteps and doors opening and soon, she heard the door next to her open as well. She covered her mouth in an attempt to quiet her breathing. Whatever it was in the bathroom with her right now, it hasn’t left just yet since she could still hear it’s footsteps. She then heard the sound of something sliding and then a click- she guessed it was the shower door opening and true enough, she heard some water splashes probably from the creature stepping on water puddles in the shower area. After a few moments, she heard it leave and close the door. She listened to the retreating footsteps until she heard the front door close as well. She didn’t get up from her hiding place, not yet. She waited just in case and after a while, she decided it’s safe and got out.

Some of the clothes on the top of the pile fell on the floor when she got out and more when she threw the ones that clung to her. She dusted herself off hoping the smell didn’t stick and took a deep breath. Not cleaning up after herself, she kicked the cloths to one side and went out the bathroom. She was pissed off and exhausted at what was happening and also, confused.

She didn’t turn any of the lights on and just used her phone’s flashlight. She went to the living room and looked around and something caught her eyes: a picture of a man in his late twenties. Short dark brown hair, equally brown eyes, and is handsome looking. She recognized the man in the photo as a teacher in their middle school.

“So this house is Mr. Sakamaki’s…” she felt weird. She was at the house of one of their teachers. She’s always just seen them at school so she never really imagined about their private lives. She then remembered about the gate opening by itself earlier. At the back of her mind, she thought that maybe this meant something.

She explored the downstairs area first. Remembering something they’ve read before on a book (or was it from the internet?), she took the container of salt from the kitchen since it apparently wards off evil spirits or something. After that, she went upstairs to check everything out.

The house had only two rooms since the teacher is an unmarried man. The first room was plain- it has a bed and some closets which she found out were empty. She then went to the 2nd room which probably belongs to the teacher. The bed was bigger, the curtains are dark red and the closets look fancy with the designs. The bed is facing the wall so at her right side, a few feet from the door is the tv. There was also a shelf at the left side of the wall.

She checked the closets first: just clothes- nothing out of the ordinary. The drawers were next- some underwear (she closed it shut as fast as she could after she saw what was inside), socks, a few accessories in boxes and…

“Huh?” she pulled out a slightly open box from the bottom left drawer in the corner. Something is stuck on the cover preventing it from closing completely “What the… why?”

Inside were pieces of clothing… female underwear to be precise. She placed it on the floor to examine what else was in the drawer. Another box but this time, there were medicines or drugs of some sort in it and at the back of the drawer are some rope. She was starting to have a strange nagging suspicion at the back of her mind as to what these things meant.

Something fell behind her, startling her. She turned around to see some things from the very top of the shelf scattered on the floor, as if someone pushed them off to fall. She looked around and gulped- there was no one else in there but her. She stood up but stayed on the spot she was standing on debating on whether she’ll even check on the things that have fallen until suddenly, as if a gust of wind have just blown (despite there not having any open windows or doors), the black book on the floor opened by itself, flipping the pages fast until it settled on one page.

Curious, she a few steps and took a peek from where she stood at the other side of the bed. The book she saw was in fact an album and inside are several pictures of one girl wearing their school uniform. She finally decided to walk over to it and grabbed the album to examine every page. All of the photos were of females of varying ages from teenagers to young women. Some of them she even recognize and there are a few from their school even. The photos seem to have been taken without the consent of the person in the photo.

“Is this guy some kind of stalker? How disgusting!”

\--

_*click*_

Yoichi hears a clicking sound behind him, putting him out of his trance. He got up and tried opening the door to the Student Council room and when he pushed, the door opened easily. The room had two long tables parallel to each other and chairs for each Student Council member with the president’s table and chair separate at the front end of the other tables. There were a few lockers and shelves inside the room and some boxes on one side. He checked the lockers 1st and found items belonging to the members of the council. The shelves had books, albums, and several year books. The boxes had decorations for the school events coming up. Looking up, he saw a small box on top of the lockers. Using one of the chairs, he reached for the box and looked inside.

“Missing Person- Takamachi Izuru…” Yoichi reads the print. There was a picture of a girl with short dark blue hair tied up in twin tails with heart-shaped hair ornaments and brown eyes. She was wearing the female school uniform “I kind of remember seeing this before a few years ago. I don’t remember hearing if she’d ever been found.”

Looking inside, there were a few copies of the flyer he’s holding and there were also flyers for other missing people- 2 other students of their school and a teacher and all of them seemed to have been cases from a few years back. At the bottom of the box is a flashlight that thankfully had batteries. He placed everything back in the box and ran downstairs towards the basement.

The basement was big but cramped with all of the junk placed inside. There were unused old desk and chairs, tables, boxes of random items and decorations, school equipment and of course, the old lockers. He tried opening them all and only a few are locked. He took out the key he found earlier and tried it on the lockers.

First locker- empty. Sesond locker- empty. Third locker—

“Ahhh!!!” Yoichi screamed as the flashlight fell out of his hand. He stepped back and fell on his butt as he tried getting away from what he saw. Inside the 3rd locker is a corpse- it was already rotting and bones can be seen amidst the decaying flesh. The corpse hanging from inside the locker was wearing their female school uniform albeit tattered and ripped. Horrible smell suddenly came out of the locker as if the locker itself blocked the stench while it was closed.

He covered his mouth and nose to stop himself from throwing up and also to block the smell coming from the dead body. He was scared but couldn’t look away. Shining his flashlight on the corpse, he examined it from where he sat- from whatever was left of the body, he could see some short dark blue hair from her head and near the tip is a tie with a heart-shaped bead close to falling off. His eyes widen… he recognized the hair tie from somewhere.

“Takamachi… Izuru.” He muttered while the image of the girl from the missing person poster flashed back in his mind. Suddenly, he heard the door to the basement open once again and then footsteps- somebody else was here and it doesn’t feel like a good thing at all. “I gotta hide!”

He turned off his flashlight and got inside one of the lockers to hide. Looking outside from the slits in the locker’s door, he could only see pitch black darkness. The footsteps came closer and closer until whomever or whatever it was is already down there with him. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness of the room, he started to see something move and two glowing red orbs floating in midair which he soon realized were eyes. He let out a gasp but quickly covered his mouth. The orbs moved around probably looking for the source of the sound earlier. In his mind, Yoichi is praying to whatever gods out there that whatever is out there doesn’t find him.

\--

Before Mitsuba could even step down the stairs from the 2nd floor, the front door opened once again. She tiptoed back to the 2nd floor hallway and went to the 1st room. She hid herself in the closet and took out the salt. She readied herself for whatever should happen. Listening intently, she could hear the footsteps coming from the hallway and her own heartbeats.

She heard a click. The door to the room she had been hiding had finally been opened. She waited and waited until she heard the footsteps stop and the door of the closet slowly opened. She kept her eye on the door until it opened enough for her to see- the black figure earlier had taken a bit more human shape but it’s face is twisted into a disfigured grin. She immediately opened the container and threw the salt at it’s face making it scream as parts of his face started to melt like acid. She took the opportunity to run as fast as she could, closing doors on her way out. As she got outside, the scream started to fade away. She didn’t wait any longer and got back to the park, picking up the basket on her way.

“I better get back…” she said, panting. She was tired and her heart is still beating fast. She quickly went to buy drinks on the vending machine and went back to the base.

“You’re back! Uh, Mitsuba-san, are you alright?” Akane asked as she welcomed the blonde back

“Did something happen? Are you okay? You’re not hurt are you?” Tomoe ran up to her and started to ask questions

She sat down on the floor to catch her breath, placing the basket next to her. It took her a while before she could answer “Don’t worry, I’m fine. Some weird stuff just started to happen.” Mitsuba smiled at her worrying companions “I’m sorry I took so long.”

“I’m glad you’re alright.” The blonde girl gave everyone a drink. She found it refreshing as her ordeal earlier exhausted her and made her thirsty. As she drank the last drop of her beverage, she felt something else on her mouth.

Spitting it out onto the palm of her hands, she saw a green metal ring with another thinner black metal band as an outer layer “What the heck is this?”

\--

It was quiet… too quiet in fact. He doesn’t hear anymore footsteps. He was scared but he knew he couldn’t stay there for too long. His friends are waiting for him. Taking a deep breath and gathering all the courage he could muster up, Yoichi slowly opened the door and stepped outside. Nothing happened. Turning the flashlight on again, he shone the light everywhere but he was alone again. Getting scared of staying in the dark basement alone with a corpse, he decided to leave but as he turned around, he heard a soft banging noise. He turned around and found out the sound was coming from one of the locker… specifically the one with the corpse.

With enough space between himself and the locker, he reached out to open the door. The moment he pulled it open, the corpse suddenly flung itself on him making him scream. He tried getting it off but it wouldn’t let go of him. It grabbed onto his right hand and before he knew it, it stopped moving and fell off of him. He ran as fast as he could out of the basement and closed the door behind him. A hand on his chest, he felt his erratic heartbeat and tried calming himself down. Then he noticed something on his wrist- a black bracelet with a thin green line on its center as the only design it has.

“Where did this come from?” he thought then he remembered the corpse earlier and how it grabbed his hand.

Then he heard someone running up the stairs. He stood frozen for a while, thinking it might be the red-eyed creature from earlier so he ran towards the front entrance but it was still locked. Having nowhere else to go and no other clue, Yoichi forced himself up those stairs to chase after whatever ran up a few moments ago.

He followed the footsteps and in the end, he found himself at the 5th floor of the school. The hallway was empty so he walked around while looking inside the rooms from the glass on the doors and soon, he saw someone- with his back away from Yoichi, the only thing the boy could gather is that the person inside is a tall male, with short brown hair and is wearing a suit. The man just stood there looking out the window.

Yoichi heard a ‘click’ and the door in front of him opened.

\--

Everyone was asleep again. The weather is cold and there was nothing to do so they didn’t have much of a choice. They tried playing with their phones earlier until they were reminded that the secret base didn’t have any place to plug their chargers on.

Tomoe watched over everyone as they slept peacefully. She kept thinking about those who left and what was happening to them and of course, her mind wanders off and she’s left to worry about her little brother who insisted on going. “Yoichi… please be okay. I shouldn’t have let you go on your own.”

_“Tomoe- oneechan…”_

“Huh?” she heard a faint voice “Is anybody there?”

_“Onee-chan…”_

It was a bit louder this time and she recognized it. There was no mistake- it was Yoichi’s voice. “Yoichi? Is that you, are you okay?” She asked. She heard the voice calling out to her again, this time, from the outside. She hurriedly opened the door and after just one blink, she found herself surrounded by darkness.

\--

The man in front of him didn’t move an inch. Not when he pushed open the door so he could fit, not when he took a step inside the classroom and not when he was getting closer. Yoichi could hear his heart beating fast and loud in his chest.

He gulped “Uh, um… w-who are you?”

The man slowly turned around making Yoichi take a few steps back. Then the door behind him suddenly closed and a click was heard. Yoichi looked behind him to see the door lock itself and when he looked in front of him again, the man’s distorted face with blood pooling out of it’s eyes and the mouth twisted into a scream was right in front of him hovering above his face.

“YoU sAw iT… DidN’t yOu?”

That moment is when Yoichi screamed and ran to the back of the room. The man’s limbs twisted in all directions as it moved towards him in a limp. Soon, several black spikes started coming out of the man’s arms and legs, then a pair of horns on either side of his head. His teeth became huge spikes as his jaw split apart into a grin and his hand evolved into huge black claws. Then lastly, from his back emerged scythe-like wings.

Yoichi threw desk and chairs at it and he also started pushing some of them in different directions. He had a bit of trouble due to their weight but it at least bought it some time as the creature doesn’t really try to move them as it just pushed them as it moved.

The room was a mess and Yoichi was cornered with his back on the wall and the monster in front of him. He was scared, tears were falling from his eyes and he was desperate. His mind plays _“Please save me!"_ on repeat. His eyes locked with the creature’s slit red ones and the reflection he sees wasn’t of himself but of _his sister’s._

His eyes widened in shock and worry. Thinking his beloved older sister was in danger with no one to help her made him angry. The fear he felt for himself earlier was replaced by worry for his sister and he was desperate to do something. _“Please don’t let anything happen to her. I’d do anything so somebody, please help!”_

The bracelet on his hand glowed and a black mist soon emerged from it surrounding his hand. A few seconds later, there was a bright light that temporarily blinds both Yoichi and his attacker. After his eyes adjusted, the boy slipped away from the corner and ran to the back of the room while the monster was distracted. As he ran, he noticed that he was holding something- a huge black bow. Although he didn’t know where it came from or why he has it, in his mind, he knew how to use it.

The monster soon became aware of what happened and immediately tried to get to where Yoichi went. Yoichi pointed an arrow at his target and fired but it just barely hit. He tried again and again as he shifted his position for a better angle and sometimes, moving into a different spot when the monster is close to getting to where he was. The monster seems to be getting angrier and more restless as it moved and screamed. It was standing at the far side of the room, with it’s back to the window. It seems to be getting ready to jump at him. The brunette takes a stance and aims, pulling the arrow back as far as he could. He wanted to hit the creature and hit it hard. Power soon surges through the arrow as it glowed brighter and brighter.

When the monster jumped forward, Yoichi fires. It hit straight towards the monster’s torso, making a hug hole in it before exploding. The wall behind breaks and the glasses of the window’s shatter. Yoichi was pushed backwards by the force of the explosion and when he came to, the monster was gone and all that’s left is destruction. He walks towards the hole in the wall and when he looked outside, he saw his friends running towards the school.

\--

“Yoichi!” Kimizuki shouted as he and the others ran towards the destroyed classroom Yoichi was seen in. When he finally opened the door, he was greeted by a crying Yoichi who immediately tackled him into a tight hug.

“I’m so happy to see you guys! I was so scared!” Yoichi said as he cried.

“What are you doing here? You suddenly disappeared on us!” Kimizuki asked

“I-I don’t know.” Yoichi pulled away to wipe off his tears “I was running after you guys and the next thing I know was I’m in here. I couldn’t open any of the doors and windows so I was stuck here then weird things started to happen.”

“I see. We’re just glad you’re okay. We really were worried about you.” Shinoa smiled as she looked at her friend. Deep inside, she was happy the boy was alive. Yoichi ended up hugging Kimizuki again saying how he’s also glad that they were okay. Before the pink haired boy could even pull himself away from the hug, the two girls suddenly joined in earning a protest from him while they laughed.

\--

They didn’t waste time on explanations and ran back towards the base, worried about everyone else and about Yoichi’s missing sister. When they arrived, they saw someone unconscious by the door.

“Nee-chan!” Yoichi quickly ran over to his sister shaking her awake. Everyone else ran towards the two to check on her. The door opened and Akane helped them all get in. They waited until the older girl woke up. They have questions to ask.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter would be mostly backstories and nice stuff.
> 
> I forgot to thank the people who bookmarked this. Still can't believe you guys like this. Anyways, since we rarely have an internet connection, the next chapters might take a while to get uploaded.


	4. CHAPTER 4- The Calm Before the Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A peaceful night spent together before everything goes downhill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Another pain in the ass chapter. I'm sorry. Nothing much happens because I just want to answer a few backstory questions.

Tomoe woke up on the bed surrounded by her worried companions and her little brother by her side holding her hand. They were all staring at her with concern. She sat up with a bit of help from her brother who supported her back with his arms. “What happened?”

“We saw you passed out in front! We were so worried.” Yoichi then hugged his sister “They told me you were gone! Where did you go?”

“Are you okay, Tomo-nee?” Kimizuki stepped forward and asked “When we got back here earlier, you were gone and we couldn’t find you but when we got back here again just a while back, you were unconscious by the door. What’s going on?”

Tomoe ruffled her little brother’s hair as he hugged her and then turned to look at the others “I’m not really sure. I remember us drinking the stuff Mitsuba-chan gave bought earlier and then we talked for a while and then they ended up falling asleep again and then…”

“Then what happened, Tomoe-san?” it was Shinoa’s turn to ask

The older girl just shook her head “I don’t remember anything after that but I feel fine. Sorry for worrying you all. Anyways, how did everything go?” after she asked that question, Shinoa and the others told everyone what happened when they left the base. After that, Yoichi and Mitsuba also told their story.

“That person…” Mitsuba spoke with a disturbed expression as everyone awaited her next words “The teacher you saw was probably Mr. Sakamaki. Your description kinda matches.”

“I think I’ve heard of that teacher. He’s worked at the school after graduating from a university. He’s pretty popular with some female students for being good-looking but there were rumors about him being a pervert to some of them.” Shinoa recalled

“The house I was in was his and I found some very disturbing things like whole albums filled with pictures of girls and some are from our school.” Mitsuba paused for a moment to think “Oh yeah, the girl you said before Yoichi… the one on the flyer?

“Takamachi Izuru? The girl who went missing a few years back?”

“Yeah. Saw pictures of her on the album, too.”

With that, everyone got to piece the story together. They were disturbed and baffled at what they found out. Then suddenly, Lacus spoke “Okay, we get it but I wanna ask, this…” he points to Yoichi “scaredy cat also got a weapon-thingy?” everyone then took out whatever they found earlier.

Yoichi ignored the purple-haired boy’s insult “Yeah, this bracelet suddenly turned into a bow and I could fire these arrows that appear out of nowhere. Wait, ‘also’? You mean you guys have one, too?”

“Not all of us.” Kimizuki held up his card and showed it to the brunette and his sister “This one turned into two swords.”

Mitsuba and Shinoa held up a ring and a small metal rod respectively “We haven’t used them but maybe these things are the same as those.” Shinoa says as she concentrated “But no matter what we do, it wouldn’t change into anything.”

“Maybe there needs to be an emergency? A fight or something I mean, Yoichi and Kimizuki’s items transformed when there was a battle.” Mika thought loudly “And you guys got those while there were ‘monsters’, as you say, chasing you.”

“What does this all mean?” Tomoe asked “Oh, by the way… who is that kid behind you?”

Mika looked behind him and saw Yuu looking at the floor absent-mindedly. He remembered what happened earlier and he still hasn’t gotten an answer out of the raven-haired child. He looked back at the older girl and her brother whose now standing close by as well and answered “This is Yuu-chan. I met him earlier when we split up to look for you, Yoichi.”

Yuu finally looked at them and introduced himself “I’m Yuuichirou but you can call me Yuu.”

“Oh, I’m Saotome Tomoe and this is my little brother Yoichi.” Tomoe smiled at the boy “Nice to meet you.”

Yoichi suddenly grabbed onto both of Yuu’s hands with his startling the dark-haired boy “It’s nice to meet you, Yuu-kun! I’m Yoichi.”

Yuu went wide-eyed not knowing what to say to the overly-friendly boy in front of him “Uh, okay.”

Beside them, the other kids are still talking to each other, with the little children asking if they could have a look at the items the others have found and Lacus and Rene talking (mostly complaining on Lacus’ part) about how they don’t have the cool stuff the others got. Shinoa and Mitsuba were having a conversation in the middle of it all about food and what they would do about it.

“We should go and get food and supplies from the nearby convenience store.” Shinoa suggested

“I agree. We’d be staying here a while since this place seems to be safer than anywhere else in town.” Kimizuki responded “We need to go now though cause it’s going to be dark out.”

“Alright, I’d go, too.” Mitsuba took the basket filled with empty cans and bottles “I’ll have to return this anyways.”

“Where’d you get that?” Shinoa asked the blonde girl as she looked at the pink basket on the other girl’s hand “I didn’t know you like cute things like that. It fits you, Micchan!”

“I found it in one of the houses and I needed something to put the drinks in earlier. And stop teasing me Shinoa! I had no choice.” Mistuba glared at Shinoa who was giggling behind her hand.

“Aww… I wasn’t teasing though. You do look cute~” Shinoa continued teasing

“Can we go with you?” one of the younger children asked the older kids who just looked at each other with concern

“I’m sorry but it’s too dangerous. You guys should stay here.” Akane told them “We’d just go get you something to eat okay. What would you guys like?”

As the kids started naming things they’d want, the older kids took out their phone chargers from their bags, hoping that the outlets in the store could still be used.

\--

The sky was still cloudy and the sun isn’t visible in the sky but it’s obvious that it’s getting darker. Almost everyone went out with the exception of Yoichi and his sister who stayed behind with the little kids. As they neared the convenience store, Mika, Shinoa and Kimizuki looked away from the phone booth where they lost Takumi. Akane looked at where the others are trying to steer their eyes away from and understood, gripping the sleeve of Mika’s jacket “Is that…?” she asked and Mika slowly nodded.

They went inside the empty store. It was dark inside and the place is mostly a mess, probably from the people panicking earlier in the fog. Everyone took out their phones or flashlights too see better. They each took a metal grocery basket and proceeded to go through the aisles and grab whatever they think they could use while occasionally asking each other what they’d need.

When they saw some electric outlet, they thought of finally charging their phones. Shinoa tried 1st and it had worked. Since there were only 2 sockets, some of the boys went to check the backroom and found some extension cords with extra sockets.

“Look guys!” Lacus held up some flashlights “We found these back there!”

Rene followed him out and held up a pack of candles “And these…”

“Great!” Kimizuki went over to the checkout counter and picked up a few lighters “Then we’ll need these.”

Mika looked around in search for Yuu who hadn’t talked to him since the argument with Kimizuki. He glanced around him every few minutes while picking out what to place in his basket. As he got out of one aisle, he passed by a few of the other kids going to a different direction. Soon, he found Yuu near the entrance of the store, standing there alone not bothering to take anything. He walked towards the other boy getting the attention of a few of their companions close by who just ignored him when they saw where he was going.

“Yuu-chan.” Mika called out quietly to the boy standing in front of him “Aren’t you hungry? Come on, let’s get some food to take back to the others, okay?” he held Yuu’s hand and the other boy just stared at him.

“I’m not hungry.” Yuu then frees his hand from Mika’s then looking away.

“What’s wrong? If it’s about this afternoon… I’m sorry if I said something offensive. I really don’t understand what’s going on. I mean,” Mika scratched the back of his head with his free hand “What’s wrong with going with the others? Do you not like them or something?”

Yuu looked as if he didn’t know what to say or how to put whatever it is he wanted to say “I-it’s not that. I just--”

Before Yuu could finish, they heard Kimizuki yell out to them “Are you guys done shopping? We’re leaving soon!”

Mika looked at Yuu and grabbed his hand, pulling him onto a nearby counter and handing him a basket before moving on “You might not be hungry now but you will be later. You’re coming with me.”

Yuu didn’t protest anymore and they went about taking whatever they wanted with someone reminding them not to take anything they couldn’t cook. Mika looked at the items on the shelf as he continued to speak to Yuu “Too bad we couldn’t cook anything in this condition. It would be nice to eat curry. That’s my favourite.”

“Mine, too.” Mika heard Yuu mutter which made him smile.

After ‘shopping’, everyone gathered near the entrance. “So, we’re just gonna leave, right? I mean in the zombie movies, those people don’t pay for whatever they take out of abandoned stores.” Lacus commented

“Besides, even if you do pay, no one is gonna be receiving it anyways.” Rene added

When they got out, Akane placed down her basket to one side as she rushed over to some nearby bushes to pick some flowers which she then placed near the phone booth where Takumi died. Everyone else immediately placed down their items next to Akane’s as they all went towards the phone booth to offer a prayer.

\--

They examined everything they got. There were some bread, sweets, drinks and canned goods for food and the candles, lighter and flashlights they found earlier and miscellaneous things they might need. Looking at everything, Mitsuba noticed that almost half the cans they took didn’t have easy-open lids “Uh, we don’t happen to have gotten a can opener did we?”

“Wait! I remember having one…” Yoichi beamed and took out the swiss army knife in his pocket “I found this in school earlier!” he handed the item to the others who started discussing what they’d be eating for dinner. Yoichi then walked over to where Akane was and took something out of his pocket “Uh, Akane-san…”

Akane turned to look at Yoichi who held out his hand in front of her “What… is that?”

“I found it earlier. It’s Takumi’s necklace. I forgot to give it to you earlier.”

The girl took the necklace which still had a few blood stains on it. It was a small gold-colored necklace with a wing pendant “Yeah, Takumi told us his parents gave it to him before the accident.” She quickly wiped the tears forming in her eyes “Thank you, Yoichi.”

“No problem.”

They lighted a candle they placed in an empty can which they set in the middle of the room. It lighted up nearly the whole base. After eating their dinner, they all talked to each other to pass the time. Most of them sat in a circle around the candlelight and some sat on the bed. Yuu decided to sit in the far corner of the room away from everyone.

“This ‘Secret Base’ of ours used to belong to some of my older siblings and their friends.” Shinoa explained “They had this built when they were little… with help of course. They let us use it when they grew up.”

“Oh, I see. Have you guys been friends for a long time?” Akane asked “You guys seem so close.”

“Well, me and Shinoa met when we were little since our families are kinda close to each other.” Mitsuba glanced at Shinoa “They have us go to the same school, too but we’re not always classmates.”

“Yep and in 2nd grade, we had different classes and that was also when I met Yoichi.” Shinoa added “Kimizuki on the other hand, transferred a few months later and became friends with Yoichi.”

“Them on the other hand…” Kimizuki points Lacus and Rene “Are not friends. They used to bully us when we were in elementary.”

“Oh, come on. We stopped didn’t we?” Lacus smirked

“Only because you’ve found new victims, you a**holes.”

“Okay, okay… Shihou-kun, not in front of the little kids!” Tomoe said as she explained to the younger children about the language they should not use.

“Oh, sorry.”

“And you guys?” Shinoa asked Mika and Akane “You said you guys came from the same orphanage, yes?”

Akane nodded “That’s right. I’ve been there since I was little when I lost my parents. A few years later, Mika arrived and we became friends instantly since we were the oldest.”

“We became the big brother and big sister of all the youngest orphans living there. Then the kids got adopted one by one then my mom, Krul Tepes adopted me almost 3 years ago and then we moved abroad.” Mika happily told them

“How about you, Akane-san?” Kimizuki asked

“I didn’t want to leave the orphanage.” Akane explained giving out a faint smile “The kids I was growing up with have gotten adopted but new kids do arrive and I still want to help and be their big sister.”

“What’s wrong, Akane?” Mika asked noticing the girl in the verge of tears

“I’m sorry… it’s just, I remember Takumi.” Akane wiped away her tears “He’s our little brother, too.”

The room fell quiet after that, no one knowing what else to say. Everyone seemed affected with the memory of losing one of their companions especially the ones who were there. Mika hugged Akane and apologized for failing as a big brother. The younger children then surrounded their big brother and big sister and gave them a hug. “I’m sorry for crying like this. I didn’t mean to make everyone sad.”

“It’s fine. We still don’t know what’s going on but if someone or something is behind this, we’re gonna stop them for our sakes and Takumi’s” Kimizuki said which everyone agreed on and Akane muttered a ‘Thank you’ to the boy.

Yoichi smiled at the scene before him and wiped his own tears as well. He felt the bracelet on his wrist on his cheeks as he brushed away the tears with his hand. He stared at it and thought “I’d protect everyone, too!” then on the corner of his eye, he caught Yuu sitting alone by himself on the corner.

Tomoe turned to look at what her brother was staring at and decided to call out to Yuu “Hey, why are you sitting there alone? Won’t you join us?”

Everyone’s eyes was suddenly on Yuu. Almost all of them waited for the quiet boy to answer except Kimizuki who just glared at his direction. “Anything wrong, Yuu-kun?” Yoichi asked

Before Yuu could answer, Kimizuki yelled “His brain is probably what’s wrong. Don’t mind him! He’s not even supposed to be here.”

“Kimizuki, calm down!” Shinoa said as she patted him on the back “Don’t tell me you’re still mad about what happened earlier.”

“Huh? What happened earlier?” Yoichi asked as he looked at Shinoa

Shinoa smirked and Mitsuba sighed while Kimizuki got visibly angrier as the memory played back on their minds. Before anyone else could explain Lacus spoke in an amused way “See, we were gonna look for you…” he points at Yoichi “and this guy…” then he points at Kimizuki “said we should split up in 2 groups so it was him, shorty, twintails and blondie over there.” he then points to Mika “Then me, Rene and that kid over there.” He then points at Yuu.

“But he was being a b*tch about it and didn’t want to because apparently, he isn’t going anywhere without Mika.” Kimizuki then added “He then complained about me making a decision even though he’s just an outsider in all this.” He then took a step forward as Yuu stood up as well, glaring back at him

“Please just calm down, both of you!” Mitsuba pulled Kimizuki back

“That’s not even the best part!” Shinoa suddenly spoke in an amused way “When Yuu-san said he’s not going without Mika-san…”  
“Shinoa, please no…” Mitsuba asked her friend

“He held onto Mika-san’s hand and picked a fight with Kimizuki!” Shinoa swooned “It was so romantic, huh?” then Mitsuba promptly elbows her and Lacus laughs in the background “So, what’s you real relationship with each other?”

Everyone turned their attention to a now furiously blushing Mika and Yuu who was looking away in an attempt to hide his also reddening face. “Is that true, Mika? What’s that about?” Akane looked at her brother curiously

“I-it’s nothing like that… I mean it’s just.” Mika stuttered as he tried to explain what even he didn’t understand “Yuu-chan…”

“Now that you have everyone’s attention, why don’t you explain to us what happened earlier?” Kimizuki asked

Yuu’s face became that of annoyance and answered “Huh? Why does it even matter?”

“Because we hardly know anything about you, dumbass!” the pink-haired boy shouted “You have been with us for nearly half a day yet the only thing we know about you is your name and the reason how you’re still alive and even that is questionable.”

“Yuu-chan… I’m sorry but, can you tell us anything else about yourself?” Mika looked at Yuu

“You said you lived around here, didn’t you?” Mistuba added “Your parents must have been around when the fog hit but you don’t seem to care at all.”

It took a few moments but Yuu finally spoke “My mom… passed away when I was young and my dad… we’re not really that close so…” he sighed “I don’t really mind not being with them.”

“And?” Kimizuki stepped forward once again “Is that all? And your behaviour earlier?”

“Uh, Yuu-kun.” Yoichi asked “Did you know Mika-kun before this?”

Yuu just stared at Mika who was confused, as if waiting for something. Yuu just looked disappointed and muttered “I guess not.”

“Okay, that’s enough!” Tomoe exclaimed “It’s late and we should all get some rest. This has been a long day so let’s please not start a fight.” She then walked over to where Yuu is and placed a hand in the boys shoulder “If it’s too hard for you to talk about anything, then we’ll wait. But I do hope you’d trust us and we’d try to trust you, too.” 

Everyone then left the circle and decided to chat with others on their own. Mika spotted Yoichi and walked up to the boy “Yoichi…”  
“Eh? Oh, Mika-kun. What is it?”

“Akane told me that you gave her back Takumi’s necklace earlier, thank you.”

Yoichi shook his head and smiled “It’s no problem at all. I found it earlier by the phone booth before we got separated. It was covered in blood so it was kind of hard to get it but I knew it was important.”

“Still, thanks. What you did was a big deal for us.” Mika then shifted his gaze towards Yoichi’s friends “You and your friends are all really nice.”

“I guess so. Shinoa-san likes to tease others, Mitsuba-san can be strict and Kimizuki-kun can be pretty mean but once you get to know them, they’re really great friends.” Yoichi said as he watched his friends talk to each other

“I think I can see that. Kimizuki-kun is kinda scary at 1st though.”

“Yeah, he could be but he really is nice. He’s probably just worried about his sister.”

“Sister?”

Yoichi nodded “A little sister. She’s sick and is recovering in a hospital in Tokyo. He’s probably worried that this situation might be happening there, too. I guess that’s why he’s been suspicious about Yuu-kun all this time.”

“Oh… I think I understand now.”

Yoichi then took his leave to be with his friends. Mika spotted Yuu still sitting alone in the corner and decided to join him. “Yuu-chan, you okay?” Yuu sat back down on his corner and nodded

“Can I join you here, then?”

Yuu nods once and let Mika sit closer to him “Why aren’t you with them? I thought they were your friends.”

Mika chuckles and said “I don’t want to leave you here alone. It seemed sad seeing you like this.”

“Why would you care if I was alone?”

“Because we’re friends?”

“Huh?” Yuu looked at the blonde with confusion “How can you say we’re friends? Like they said, you don’t even know much about me.”

“After what happened earlier, I kinda thought we might be. I still don’t understand why you wanted to be with me instead of going with the others but in a way, inside I was happy.” Mika blushed at his words and so did Yuu “Would you tell me why you said those things earlier?”

Yuu glanced at him then looked away sadly “It’s… uh, it was nothing. I just knew you before I knew them so I wanted to go with you. Sorry if you didn’t want to.”

Mika shook his head and smiled “It’s okay. I was just confused earlier. Are you sure we haven’t met before, though?” Mika felt a weight on his shoulders. Yuu had already fallen asleep with his head resting on the blonde’s shoulders “Maybe I’ll ask again next time.” He whispered as he, too fell asleep.

The little children were made to sleep in the bed again with Akane watching over them. Tomoe is sitting in one corner with her brother’s head on her lap, both slowly falling asleep and just a few feet from them is Kimizuki. Mitsuba and Shinoa slept sitting side-by-side near the door. Lacus and Rene took the place they sat on earlier near the toy chest and in the far right corner of the room, Mika sat next to Yuu.

The night passed by quietly, unaware of a strange presence watching over them.

\--

Morning came and Mika woke up a bit disoriented. Looking around him, he didn’t recognize the place he was in- wooden ceiling and walls. He didn’t even feel like he slept on a bed. Looking up, he realized that he wasn’t sleeping on a bed but on the wooden floor and his head was lying on Yuu’s lap. “Yuu-chan…” he muttered

“Good morning, Mika.” Yuu greeted him

“Good morning…” that’s when Mika remembered where he was and why he was there. The memories of yesterday flooded back into his mind. He sighed “So it wasn’t all just a dream…”

When he was finally properly awake, realizing that he’s been sleeping in Yuu’s lap hit him hard. He sat up as fast as he could and faced his friend “How long have I been sleeping like that?”

“Oh… I don’t know. I woke up earlier because the others were making a fuss about how they’re gonna cook some of the food they got.” Yuu pointed outside “They thought of grilling the fry-able stuff outside or something. I think I saw smoke earlier so I guess they made a fire. Then I thought you were probably uncomfortable sleeping like that so I put your head on my lap.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Are you okay though? You’re red.” Yuu points out. Mika didn’t realize that he’d been blushing for a while now and Yuu pointing it out made his face even redder. “Seriously, if you’re sick you should tell someone.”

“No! I’m fine really… just fine!” he gave a weak chuckle and looked away, trying to calm himself down.

\--

“Okay, I think that’s enough.” Kimizuki said as the others pulled out the sausages they stuck on some branches and stuck in front of a bonfire like they were camping. “A bit more and they’ll be burnt.”

“This is the only cooked food we can eat?” Lacus complained “It’s kinda boring.”

“Quit complaining! This is the best we can do right now.” Mitsuba said as he glared at the boy

“Well, these are easy to eat!” Shinoa stared at the sausage-on-a-stick on her hands “We don’t need plates. Honestly, we could use some plates and other utensils.”  
“Where do we even get those? They don’t have them at the convenience store.” Yoichi asked

“Supermarket, probably. I mean they have those disposable ones.” Rene answered

“If we had some extra water, we could clean some of the empty cans and use them instead.” Akane suggested

Mika and Yuu got outside and saw what everyone else was doing. The kids their age were cooking and preparing breakfast in front of a fire while Tomoe was watching over the little kids playing. Mika looked up at the sky and just as it was yesterday, it was cloudy and the wind is still blowing rather cold.

“Oh, good morning sleepy-head!” Shinoa greeted the two boys who just came out of the base “We were gonna wake you up but you look so peaceful sleeping on Yuu-san’s lap! So was it nice?”

Mika’s face turned bright red once again which made the others laugh. They had offered him and Yuu something to eat. No one spoke about the conversation last night and Mika didn’t dare say anything either afraid another argument would break out. Everyone else discussed what they’re planning to do now and Yuu sat under the tree far from them, not bothering to join the conversation. Mika walked over to him and they ate in silence.

“We can’t live like this forever! We need a way out of this town.” Mitsuba exclaimed “We might get more food from the stores but who know when those… things would come and attack again.”

“Hey, your families live outside of this town, right?” Lacus asked Shinoa “Aren’t they coming to save you and stuff?”

“Yeah, they should unless the other towns…” Shinoa didn’t finish what she was supposed to say, hoping that whatever is happening in the town hasn’t spread everywhere else “But we can’t just wait for them and do nothing.”

“What do we do though?” Yoichi asked “We can’t just go through that fog. We can’t call anyone for help either because our phones get no signal.”

“You think any of the landlines work?” Rene asked, getting everybody else’s attention. They looked at him in horror as they remembered Takumi and the phonebooth “I meant from any of the houses.”

“The houses are locked and those that aren’t are dangerous.” Kimizuki replied “We haven’t tried from any of the establishments but I’m not sure if they’re safe either.”  
“But we got all this food from the convenience store and nothing bad happened.” Akane wiped the dirt off of one of the kid’s face with a handkerchief “And you guys have those weapons, right?”

“But not all of us!” Lacus exclaimed

“Are you still going on about that?” Kimizuki looked at Lacus in annoyance “We don’t know where these things came from and why we have it but we had to go through hell to obtain them! Stop complaining that you don’t have one. It means you haven’t gone through complete sh*t yet.”

“Calm down, Kimizuki-kun!” Yoichi placed both hands on Kimizuki’s shoulders in an attempt to push him down where he sat in case he wants to attack the purple-haired boy.

Mitsuba stared at the black ring she now wore on her right ring finger, examining it “Speaking of which, I haven’t had the chance to use mine, let alone find out what ‘it’ actually is.”

“It’s the same with me!” Shinoa raised a hand “I say we go out and find ourselves a working phone. If anything happens, we can use these things we got.”

“Wait! Isn’t that dangerous?” Tomoe stood up from where she sat and walked up to the group “Even with those things, you don’t even know if they’d work the way you want it to.”

“True but…” Shinoa stood up as she pulled out the black metallic trinket from her pocket “It would be just as dangerous for us to not be able to fight and much more if we stayed here any longer.”

“So I guess that’s the plan then!” Kimizuki broke the stick he was holding and looked at everyone with a smirk “We’re going out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Like the summary says, the next chapters aren't gonna be nice.


	5. CHAPTER 5- One by One (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The group splits up to look for a way to contact the outside world but the day isn't going to be as peaceful as it started.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Split into two parts because this part of the story is longer. I couldn't finish part 2 in time because I'm working on another fic. hehe *sweatdrops*

As it usually was, Yoichi’s older sister and Akane were left behind with the little kids. The young children pleaded with them multiple times asking to come with them but the situation they were in was dangerous so the older ones still said ‘no’. As they walked down the path to the street, they had discussed which person belongs in which group. Remembering the issue that came up the first time they thought of grouping together, they had all decided to let Mika and Yuu stay in the same group.

“Most of the houses are locked up and it’ll be a pain to try and find which ones aren’t so I suggest we go to area normally open to public.” Mitsuba said “The school is probably open now and we got to go to the convenience store yesterday so I guess some buildings and establishments are open.”

Kimizuki, Shinoa, Yoichi and Mitsuba went to school together, hoping they could find something else helpful and since Yoichi had already beaten the monster inside, it might be safe. Mika and Yuu went with Lacus and Rene and headed towards the city hall to find any working communication device.

\--

The gate was opened widely as it was yesterday. The doors to the school were wide open as well. The surroundings were still messy from the commotion yesterday. It was dead quiet save for their footsteps and the blowing wind outside.

“When I was locked up here yesterday, the doors leading out wouldn’t budge at all!” Yoichi says as he recalled his experience “The windows, too. Honestly, it scared me.”

“Can’t blame you. After all the crap that happened yesterday, I’d be crazy not to be paranoid in a situation like this.” Mitsuba said as she looked around the empty hallways. They tried opening classroom doors on the way and so far, none of them were locked but there wasn’t anything of note inside any of them.

“Let’s go to the principal’s office. Maybe the phone there is working.” Kimizuki suggested.

They all went to the 4th floor to get to the office. Unlike the mess everywhere else is, the principal’s office was clean and tidy. The principal or anyone else must have not been there the time of the fog. On the desk are neatly arranged stacks of papers, some pens, a table lamp, and at one side is a cordless phone. Shinoa quickly took it and dialed their house number. Surprisingly, she could hear ringing albeit faint. The others watched her in anticipation as she held the phone close to her ears waiting for someone to answer on the other end.

Then she heard the phone being picked up _“Hello?”_

\--

Lacus and Rene walked a few feet farther than their companions. Lacus was grinning and Rene kept quiet as they watched the two boys in front of them walk side-by-side and holding hands. They were debating on whether they would point it out to embarrass the two or just leave it be- after all the raven-haired boy holding Mika’s hand can get weirdly possessive if yesterday’s incident was any indication.

They stepped inside the empty office. It was a mess inside as well. They passed by many doors that were unfortunately locked. As they went farther down the hallways, they started hearing strange noises. They stopped in their tracks and tried to listen intently- it’s kind of blurry but they could hear someone talking. Soon, they heard more as if there were people having a lively conversation with one another. As they got closer to the source of the sound, the voices got louder and louder and when they were already in front of the door, the voices stopped. It became quiet once again.

They looked at one another hoping to get an idea of what they should do. They looked at the door in front of them and knew someone had to open it. Lacus and Rene took a step back and stared at Mika and then at the door then back to the blonde again. Mika knew they wanted him to open it himself. He sighed and took a deep breath and readied himself but before he could even place a hand at the doorknob, Yuu had already twisted it and pushed the door open.

The room had several desks and chairs and some of them were overturned. Pieces of papers scattered on the ground and a window at the far end is open letting the wind blow in scattering some of the papers elsewhere. There were no people inside though. They made their way in carefully, searching every corner to make sure nothing was hiding in the shadows to jump at them when least expected.

After a while, they stood at the center of the room. “No one is here.” Lacus points out

“Yeah but where did the voices come from?” Mika asked as he looked around

“I don’t know but there’s nothing in here. We better move.” Rene said and everyone agreed. They all left the room they were in. As Mika stepped out, he heard faint whispers behind him. Turning around, he found nobody there.

\--

_“Hello?”_

Shinoa heard a female voice at the other end of the line. It felt strange as the voice sounded oddly familiar. She had a bad feeling about this but still talked to whoever it was “Hello. Who’s this?”

 _“Huh? Shouldn’t I be asking you that question, hmm?”_ said the other girl. Shinoa froze- she recognized the voice and it terrified her.

“Who are you?!” she screamed. The other end was quiet for a while until Shinoa heard a soft chuckle that slowly turned into a horrifying laugh.

_“I’m Hiiragi Shinoa. Who else?”_

Her blood ran cold. The person on the other end had the same voice as hers and claims to be her. She was confused and angry at the same time “What are you talking about?! I’m Shinoa! Who the hell are you?!” The other three were shocked and confused, all eyes widened as they heard Shinoa’s words. They couldn’t hear what the other person is saying but based on their friend’s words, they had an idea of what it might be.

 _“Eh?! But I’m Shinoa!”_ the voice at the other end said in a mocking tone _“You must be mistaken or are you perhaps insane?”_

“I am not! Who are you or what are you? Why are claiming to be me?”

 _“Ahaha… I’m not claiming anything. I really am Shinoa!”_ the voice giggled and changed her tone into something more sinister _“After all, you won’t be coming back.”_

“What… what are you saying? Why-” before Shinoa could ask any more, she heard another voice at the other end of the line.

 _“Shinoa-chan… who is that?_ ” she recognized it as the voice of her older brother Shinya _“Oh, just a prank caller.”_ The person claiming to be her answered _“I thought it would be funny to answer it but it was getting boring so I guess I’ll go hang up now.”_

“Wait-“

 _“Bye-bye!”_ and after that, she could only hear a faint beep before no sound came out anymore.

\--

Mika could swear he was hearing voices. They walked around the 2nd floor aimlessly. Mika stops every once in a while, trying to calm himself down because he was hearing voices. Faint as they are, they were rather creepy and sometimes, he could understand some words clearly _“That way… that way…”_

Mika shook his head. He’d asked the others several times if they could hear voices, too but they couldn’t. It was only him so either he really is hearing voices or he’s going insane. He didn’t like either options. The path in front of them suddenly split in two as they entered a crossroad. They could continue forward or turn to their right. Either hallways are dark paths getting darker the farther you walk. “Where do we go?” Rene asked as they looked at both paths in front of them.

Mika looked to his right and the voices suddenly got a little louder and faster with chants of “That way…!” repeating over and over. Mika points to the direction to the right and said “How about… we go that way?” The two older boys shrugged and walked towards the path to the right. Yuu didn’t say a word and just held Mika’s hand as they followed.

The rooms in this hall were all unlocked and they decided to split up and search. Lacus found a phone in the room he went into but the line was cut. Mika found a radio in his but all he could get was static. The room Yuu was in also had a phone but the line was cut as well. As they went further, the hallways grew darker. They found a light switch but the lights in the hall flickered giving the place an ominous feel. They went and checked different doors as well. Mika turned the light on the room he was in but like outside, it flickered. Inside the room, he found both a phone and a radio. He tried the phone first and listened for a dial tone. At first he didn’t hear anything but slowly, he started to hear someone breathing from the other side. He thought it was his imagination until it got louder which made him drop the phone on the floor. He stepped back and went over to the radio. Turning it on, he could hear static. He changed the station and soon, he started to hear words.

_“… He… The… *static* r… h… *static* They’re here…”_

“AAAAAHHH!!!”

a loud scream could be heard from the hallway. Mika ran outside and saw Yuu doing the same. They ran towards the last door at the far end and saw Rene being dragged away to the darkness by a creature they couldn’t fully see. Big red-slitted eyes glowing in the darkness and sharp teeth awaited the boy as he was slowly being dragged by big sharp claws digging through his skin making him bleed. Mika and Yuu held onto his arms and pulled as much as they could. Then they heard another scream.

“What the hell is going on? Let me out!” Lacus banged on the door that suddenly shut itself. Behind him, the room was getting more and more pitch black and he knew that even if he couldn’t see it, something was there.

Mika looked back and forth at where the two are. He was conflicted at what he should do- stay and help pull Rene or run to where Lacus was locked up. They didn’t have enough time and one way or another; someone is going to die if they don’t do something about it. Seeing as Yuu can probably still hold onto Rene, he decided to leave him to it and go to where Lacus was “Yuu-chan, please hold onto him! I’ll go help Lacus so we can all help Rene together.” He looked at Rene before letting go “I’m sorry. I’ll be back.”

Rene looked at him and said “It’s fine, go help Lacus!”

Mika ran over to the door where Lacus was locked up in and tried opening it. He tried banging on it as well as the teen on the other side screamed. “Please open this door!”

Rene held onto Yuu’s hands for dear life as the nails digging on his back went a bit deeper making him scream in pain. He was still being dragged and in his mind, he was hoping Mika had already saved Lacus and that they both get there in time. Suddenly, he felt the hands that were holding onto him slowly loosen “What the hell are you--” he looked up and was confused and frightened. The boy in front of him held an expressionless face but what shocked him are the last thing he’d ever see- piercing red slitted eyes staring straight at him.

The door suddenly opened and Lacus was free. He and Mika ran as fast as they could to where Yuu and Rene are but it was too late. The moment they tried to grab his hand, the creature in the darkness pulled him away and closed the door shut. They froze on the spot as Rene started to scream in terror and agony. Mika covered his ears and cowered while Lacus dropped on his knees and stared at the door in horror. When it was all over, the door unlocked itself.

A moment had passed before they did anything. Lacus hurriedly opened the door and turned the lights on to reveal the blood covered room. No one was inside and the window at the back was open, letting the wind blow inside. In the middle of the room stood a single sword tainted with blood standing there with it’s tip stabbed on the ground. The purple-haired boy walked towards it and pulled it off from where it stood. He went towards the open window and looked outside.

“I’m sorry.” Yuu said apologetically “I couldn’t hold onto him properly. I’m not strong enough for it.”

“Yuu-chan…” Mika looked at the still silent boy by the window and said “I’m sorry, too. I wasn’t fast enough to save both of you.”

Lacus didn’t say anything and just walked past them right out the door. When they asked where he was going, he looked at them with anger and resentment in his eyes “I’m going to find that thing and kill it!”

\--

Shinoa wordlessly put the phone back in it’s place on the desk. The worry and frustration can be seen on her face making her friends feel the same way. They only heard one side of the phone conversation but each of them thought the same about what it was all about and it made them kind of scared to ask. Mitsuba was the 1st to speak “Shinoa, who was that?”

Shinoa looked at her straight in the eyes and said “It was me.”

“You? What do you mean by that?” Kimizuki asked

“It’s exactly that- it was me. The person who answered the phone said she was me and she even had the same voice.”

“What? But how could that be when you’re here?” Yoichi looked at Shinoa with worry “Who was that?”

“I don’t know but she said that she will be me since ‘I’m not coming back’” she said, repeating the words she heard from the ‘other Shinoa’

“That might be a fake. Maybe there’s someone or something out there masquerading as you.” Kimizuki felt angry at his sudden realization “What if the people who know us outside- our families don’t look for us because there are fakes with them?”

“If that’s the case then they wouldn’t be looking for us because we aren’t missing!” Mitsuba exclaimed “But still… our school is in this town… those ‘fakes’ would have to go here sooner or later.”

“Yeah but…” Kimizuki looked at everyone and said “what if they already thought of that before hand? We have no idea what these things are capable of. We still don’t even know what started all of this in the 1st place. Worse comes to worse, we’d be dead and no one would ever know.”

“No!” Yoichi sat on his knees and trembled “What are we going to do?”

“We can’t stay here any longer. We really need to find out what’s going on.” Mitsuba said pulling Yoichi up “We can’t give up now. If we do they’ll win! They might hurt other people, too.”

“T-that’s right.” Yoichi wiped away his tears “We gotta tell this to the others!”

They all nodded in agreement and ran out of the room. When they were about to get out the school’s main entrance, the doors suddenly closed everything went dark. They tried opening the door but it wouldn’t budge and then something emerged from the ground behind them knocking down the shoe lockers around. It was a huge shadow-like demon with glowing green eyes, sharp teeth whose color blends in with the rest of it’s body and long horns on it’s head. It’s hands have sharp claws and noticeably, it’s right hand had a red scar on it.

“That’s…” Shinoa then remembered the creature that tried to grab her at Yoichi’s house the day before and what she had done “That’s the thing that attacked me at Yoichi’s yesterday!”

The creature roared in anger as it glared at Shinoa. Mitsuba noticed and looked at her friend “I think it remembers you, too! It probably wants to kill you.”

“Yeah, I know!” Shinoa took out the small rod from her pocket and spun it in her fingers and it turned into a huge black scythe “I guess I should finish what I started.”

“A scythe, huh?” Kimizuki said as he looked at Shinoa’s weapon and took out the card from his pocket “Kiseki-O!” and with that, I had turned into swords.

Mitsuba’s ring glowed and became a huge black axe “What… so these are what our weapons look like! Not bad.” She said as she took her stance

Yoichi’s bracelet also turned into a bow and he ran back as far as he could and pulled back an arrow, aiming it at the creature “This place is too cramped for a fight like this!”

“Yoichi’s right.” Kimizuki ran to the side and got past the creature “We have to take this fight somewhere else!”

Yoichi fired the arrows straight at the creature’s right eye making it scream in pain and giving them a chance to run to the hallways. They followed Kimizuki and went upstairs straight to the rooftop. As they ran, the creature dug it’s way up destroying the ceilings making huge holes until it got to the rooftop as well. When they got to the rooftop, it was at the same time the creature emerges from the floor, not only breaking a part of the area but making cracks close by. “Damn it! I didn’t think it would break into the ceiling.” Kimizuki eyed the cracks “This is as bad as the cramped shoe locker area.”

“Actually, I think it’s worse. We could fall and die with one bad step.” Mitsuba looked around in search of areas she could move onto

The creature was having trouble moving around because part of it is still stuck on rooftop floor. It extended it’s arms to try and grab or attack any of the children but they dodge quickly. Yoichi walked over to the side of the wall from the rooftop’s entrance and climbed the metal ladder to gain higher ground. He fired several arrows to the enemy but it defended itself using it’s arms. It’s arms and hands were injured and bleeding but nothing vital was hit. “Sorry guys! I can’t hit him properly.” He said as he tried to aim at it’s head but failed.

“It’s okay, Yoichi!” Kimizuki then slashed it’s hand when it raised it trying to defend itself from more arrows “At least it still deals damage.”

“We have to cut off it’s arms or something…” Mitsuba ran and jumped as high as she could, hitting the creature’s arm with her axe. Her weapon came stuck in the creature’s skin so she kicked it’s arm as she pulled the axe, using the force to get her weapon off and be flung to a safer area. As soon as the axe was taken off, blood poured out of the injury “Ugh! I guess it’s not gonna be easy.” She sat up, trying to bear the pain she felt on her back when she hit the metallic fence surrounding the rooftop.

“You okay, Micchan?” Shinoa asked looking at where Mitsuba fell. Seeing her friend not be able to stand properly, she tried to run to where the other girl is and as she ran, she did not notice black vines with green leaves emerge from the floor, chasing her.

“Shinoa look out!” Mitsuba’s warning came late because as soon as Shinoa looked behind her, the vines were already around her, coiling themselves around her tiny body and tightening slowly. Shinoa gasped as the vines tightened once more before raising her up and flinging her away towards the second building. Her friends could only watch as she was heading towards the wall but with her weapon still in hand, she swung the scythe to the side making it’s blade hit the wall which let her avoid direct collision. She was now hanging in mid-air while holding on to the scythe’s handle using both hands. “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine!” she shouted as she tried to move towards the nearest window. Her friends breathed a sigh of relief as they saw that Shinoa was okay. Then they heard a scream- the creature was struck by one of Yoichi’s arrows on the right side of it’s head. When they looked at where the arrow was fired from, they were shocked to see Yoichi now sitting on the top of the metal fence trying to keep his balance.

“Yoichi, what the f*ck are you doing there? You could fall and die!” Kimizuki asked as Yoichi held on to the top of the fence.

“Ah! Um… remember when I hit it’s eye earlier? I-I think it has a blind spot!” Yoichi got down from the fence as Kimizuki ran towards him.

“That was dangerous! If you fell you’re dead.” Kimizuki jumped a few feet back when one of the vines tried to hit them. He barely missed it and it hit his left leg.

“I know but it was going to attack you and Mitsuba. I had to do something!” Yoichi fired more arrows that hit the creatures arm. As he distracted it, Mitsuba tried to cut off most of the vines with her axe despite her back still hurting. “Are you okay?” Yoichi asked as he stared at Kimizuki’s bleeding leg.

“I-I’m fine.” Kimizuki touched the gash across his leg “It stings but I can still move.”

“Argh! We’re hitting it but most of them are just scratches to this thing!” Mitsuba gritted her teeth “The worse damage we have dealt is Yoichi’s arrows in it’s eye!”

“We need a better plan.” Kimizuki said as he ripped off more vines that disintegrate after being cut off from it’s host. Sadly, more vines keep coming out of the ground breaking a few more areas giving them less and less places to stand on “We’re gonna be stuck here soon. Well, that or the floor would collapse and we’d fall to the 5th floor or worse.”

“I didn’t know we had any plan whatsoever. I thought we’re just blindly attacking!” Mitsuba walked back when the cracks on the floor started to crawl it’s way towards their direction “Where are these stupid vines coming from?”

They all looked down at the same time. There were now a bunch of holes in the ground and if they try, they would be able to see even a bit of the floor below. “I guess from below and since we’re losing ground, it probably spread through the rooms.”

“What-- you mean like, this thing grew bigger?” Yoichi asked in shock. The creature they saw on the ground floor wasn’t even big enough to reach the hallways when it came out of the ground in the shoe locker area.

“No. Two things- it might have been this big before but we just didn’t see because the rest of it was still underground OR it’s just the vines spreading inside the rooms.” Kimizuki explained his hypothesis as he tried looking through some of the holes from where he stood.

More vines came out of the ground and attacked them. They tried cutting off as much as they could but it seemed like there was no end to it. Suddenly, the creature’s loud scream could be heard as the vines disintegrated simultaneously. They were in shock and were confused about what was happening until they heard a familiar voice.

“Hey! You guys still okay up there?” peeking from one of the larger holes, they saw Shinoa smiling and waving at them “Those vines were coming from it’s back. I thought I’d get rid of them from the source but they won’t end unless that thing is killed.” More vines started to come out and Shinoa cut them all off with her scythe while jumping around to avoid them from hitting her.

The others were amazed at what she was doing but tried to keep their focus on the enemy in front “How do we kill it though?” as Kimizuki watched the creature flail around in a desperate attempt to hit them due to the anger and pain it must have been feeling from the attacks below, the bespectacled child thought of something as he saw it’s injured eye “Yoichi… we’ll distract it for a bit so do you think you can hit it’s mouth?”

“Huh? It’s mouth?”

“Yeah…” Kimizuki smirked “Inside.”

Yoichi smiled and nodded in understanding and aimed at the mouth. Mitsuba and Kimizuki started moving around so that the creature’s attention was on them. As it tried to grab Kimizuki, Mitsuba used the opportunity to hit it on the back making it scream letting Yoichi hit it inside its mouth. They watched as it scratched on it’s throat trying to get to where it hit. It spat out a lot of blood and it looked to be in more pain than it did with their attacks earlier.

“I knew it! It’s insides are weaker.” Kimizuki exclaimed

“So, what do we do? Only Yoichi can hit it with his arrows! We can’t use out weapons on that.” Mitsuba asked

“I can think of one but it’s risky.” the pink-haired boy looked at both of his friends who are waiting for him to finish what he was saying “Here’s the plan…”

When he told them both the plan he came up with, they both complained at how dangerous it was and asked if there was another way. After a bit of arguing and the creature trying to attack them again, the two couldn’t do anything more but to agree. “Please be careful, Kimizuki-kun.” Yoichi said as he ran back and aimed at the mouth of the creature once more.

Mitsuba ran around hitting it’s arms and using one of the injured arms as leverage, she jumped up and hit the creature on it’s head making it scream in pain. Using her axe, she hit the ground so that she wouldn’t fall flat on her face. Looking back, she saw Kimizuki running towards the creature. The boy then jumped onto an arm and then ran up and went directly inside the creature’s large mouth. Before the enemy could close it’s mouth to bite the boy, Yoichi fired an arrow onto the roof of it’s mouth making sure it doesn’t close until his friend could slide down it’s throat. When Kimizuki had done exactly that, they could do nothing and wait for him to come back. The creature’s movements stopped and so did the vines growing out from underneath.

The three watched quietly and waited until slowly, they could see cuts forming on the outside of the enemy’s skin and soon, most of it’s flesh were ripped off, making a bloody mess on the floor and spilling onto the floors below. Shinoa stepped back from where she was standing to avoid getting hit by the blood pouring out of the ceiling. When it was over, the creature slowly came crashing down to the ground floor, corpse fallen near the edge of the hole it came in from underground. The three kids ran towards the giant hole, being careful not to slip in the blood and guts scattered around, and then looked below. From the little amount of light they could get, they saw something moving- it was Kimizuki who was trying to push off the pieces of flesh and guts that fell on top of him. He tried to climb out of the corpse to one side trying to avoid moving it too much or he might fall underground.

Shinoa immediately ran down the set off stairs to the 1st floor and Yoichi and Mitsuba in the rooftop did the same. When they finally got downstairs to where their friend is, they saw him out of the creature’s body and trying to get rid of the blood on his arms, legs and face with little success. “I need a shower.” He said and then saw Yoichi running up to him. He quickly steadied himself when Yoichi leapt up and gave him a hug not caring if he also gets dirtied by blood.

“Kimizuki-kun! We’re so glad you’re okay…” Yoichi said, smiling with teary-eyes

“Congratulations! You’re plan worked.” Mitsuba said as she stood next to the boy

“Great plan but really…” Shinoa grinned as she eyed the pink-haired boy from head to toe “You look really disgusting. You need a shower.”

“I know!”

“Maybe we could use the shower room in school.” Yoichi suggested “We beat the enemy so the doors shouldn’t be locked anymore.”

“I guess.” Mitsuba groaned and placed her hand on her forehead “Damn it! It’s like were stuck on one of those video games you guys are so obsessed about.”

They looked up at the huge gaping hole at the ceilings that goes all the way up to the rooftop which let them see the dark cloudy sky above. Pieces of flesh and blood are still flowing down from above “Is the school gonna be okay though?” Yoichi asked as he stared at the cracks on the ceiling “The school might collapse.”

“Well, I’m not too sure but we have to be careful at least.” Shinoa responded

“Alright. Let’s go! The shower rooms are near the gym.” Kimizuki said as he took one last look behind him to see the creature’s dead corpse before they started walking towards the gym.

\--

Mika and Yuu ran hand in hand outside trying to catch up to Lacus who was still trying to look for the monster that took his best friend. No matter how much Mika calls for him to slow down or to stop, he wouldn’t listen and just kept running. Until they heard a loud scream which didn’t sound human. It also sounded like it was either in pain or angry or both. They stopped to listen and headed straight to the direction of the sound- the middle school building.

Nothing seemed to be wrong on the outside but when they got inside the entrance, they were speechless at what they saw- a huge creature mutilated from the waist above and it’s corpse nearly fallen to a hole in the ground. Above the ceiling are holes that reach to the rooftop and blood spilling out of the sides. “I guess the others were busy.” Mika said as he remembered that the other group decided to investigate here earlier.

They looked around for any signs of their companions but there was none. They walked around the ground floor of the school until they saw the side entrance open. They went outside and after walking around for a while, they heard running water. They immediately went to the locker rooms in the gym and found Shinoa and Kimizuki both wearing their gym clothes while sitting on the benches. They notice the bespectacled boy holding onto a towel on his bleeding leg. “Kimizuki! What happened to you? Are you okay?” Mika asked as he ran up to where the other boy was sitting and Yuu following him closely behind.

“Oh, you guys are here.” Kimizuki looked at the other two behind Mika and noticed someone was missing “Hey, where’s Rene?”

The three boys were silent and none of them looking at him in the eyes. Lacus however looked really mad and there were tears falling from his eyes. “We got attacked earlier and it took him.” The purple-haired boy explained with frustration in his voice. “We found this in the room where he was taken into and killed.” He then showed them the sword he has been holding.

Shinoa and Kimizuki didn’t know what to say. They weren’t on good terms with the other two but they knew how close the two boys were- best friends since childhood and would usually be seen together. Now one of them is gone. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t need your pity. I’ll go avenge him myself.” The purple-haired boy said as he walked outside

“Hey! Where are you going?” Mika asked

“Outside. I’ll just go check around the school.” Lacus then walked away leaving the other four inside the room

It took a few moments of silence before they all started to explain the situation and what had happened to their groups up to this point with Kimizuki finishing with “Now, Yoichi and Mitsuba went to the 2nd building’s infirmary cause the 1st building is probably dangerous now.”

“Oh… so that’s what happened at the entrance. We were shocked when we saw a giant mutilated corpse on the way here.” as Mika said those words, the doors suddenly opened and Mitsuba and Yoichi who were both wearing their gym clothes as well, came in carrying the supplies they took from the infirmary. Shinoa and Mitsuba quickly cleaned up Kimizuki’s leg wound (which is thankfully not as serious as they 1st thought) with alcohol which made the boy wince, put wound medicine on it and then wrapped it up with a bandage while Yoichi handed them whatever they needed as he carried the 1st aid kit.

When it was over, Yoichi welcomed the other two back with a hug and asked them what had happened and where their other two companions are. Hearing the story they have told Kimizuki and Shinoa earlier made Yoichi and Mitsuba sad. They hated Lacus and Rene but would never wish for something like this to befall on them especially now that they’re supposed to be on the same side being the only survivors of the strange occurrence in their town. “Where is he now?” Yoichi asked them and they said Lacus went out to try and catch find the demon that took his friend “Aren’t we gonna follow him?”

“We should but you guys have injuries, too.” Kimizuki looked at his friends and remembered the fight earlier

“We’re fine. Me and Yoichi already fixed our wounds back at the infirmary that’s why we took a bit too long to return. Besides, yours was much worse than ours.” Mitsuba explained

“How about you two?” Yoichi looked at Mika and Yuu with worry

“We’re fine. It wasn’t as bad as what you guys went through. We didn’t have to fight or anything.” Mika said as he looked at Yuu who gave a nod “We should follow him. It’s dangerous to go alone.”

“Alright everyone!” Shinoa stood up from the bench and said “I think we’ve had enough break. We have to go.”

“Okay.” Mitsuba replied then looked over to Mika and Yuu “Still no weapons?”

Mika shook his head “Not yet but Lacus got a sword.”

“I see. I guess we need to investigate further.” Shinoa walked past everyone and opened the door outside the locker room “Let’s go!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a part in the game wherein a character could die in the playground. Of course, not knowing what playground equipment that was, I just killed Rene somewhere else but it's kind of the same- getting pulled into the darkness. And I can't believe I did that- the battle scene made this fic hard to write and that scene alone took me days! It was crappy I know but that's the best I could do. Since the fic isn't over yet, I'm gonna have to try and make more. T^T Also... We're halfway through this fic, probably.


	6. CHAPTER 6- One by One (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their search for the enemy continues and they soon get separated once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank god I'm done! I couldn't finish this fast enough because of writer's block and when I got back to writing, I couldn't stop so this chapter was supposed to be longer but I decided to cut this into two so I could edit it in AO3 easily.
> 
> And I've not been able to go online for a month bec. of connection problems. I now have a months worth of fic reading to catch up on XD

Earlier, almost two hours after the other kids left to go to town, the little kids back at the secret base are playing together. They were running around playing tag or climbing trees to pass the time and try to forget the horrible things that had been happening but of course, it couldn’t be helped that they would cry from time to time because they missed their other friends from the orphanage- the ones who were lost to the fog yesterday. Watching over them are the two girls Akane and Tomoe. They too are affected by the situation but tries to be strong for the little ones. “I hope everyone is okay.” Tomoe said as she watched the children play hopscotch in the dirt “I can’t help but worry especially for Yoichi.”

“I know.” Akane sat right next to the older girl “I really wish they’d come back soon.”

“I wonder if our parents are looking for us. They left early yesterday morning and were supposed to come back last night but…”

“Maybe they can’t get past the fog. They’re probably worried about you two.” Akane gave the other girl a smile to reassure her “You’re lucky. I wish out parents were like that.”

Tomoe felt as if she was struck somewhere as she heard those words “I’m sorry. I forgot that--”

“It’s okay. We’re all like family in the orphanage anyways.” Akane turned to watch the little children once again “Even if our lives weren’t perfect we were always happy since we have each other. I wish the other kids are still here.”

“Yeah. But we’re gonna protect the ones that are still here.” Tomoe held onto Akane’s hand “Everyone would do the same. We’re like family now after all. Just like what you and Mika would say.”

Akane nodded and smiled “Yeah! I’m sure they’ll be happy if they knew. You know, Mika acted like a big brother to everyone back at the orphanage and wasn’t all too willing to get adopted back then. He tries so hard to act happy like nothing was wrong to support us even if deep inside, he might be in more pain that we were in. I’m sure that right now, he’s still doing that. But now that you are all here, maybe he doesn’t have to take it all in by himself.”

“He’s a really nice boy, huh? Don’t worry, we’re here and we’ll help you both. As long as we’re together, we’re not alone!”

“Right!” Akane said and they continued to talk like that for a while longer until they heard one of the kids cry. A little boy tripped and fell and now had a small wound on his knee. Akane helped him sit on one of the chairs they took outside and cleaned the wound with some water and bandaged it. “I wish we had some first aid kit.”  
Tomoe went over to them to see if the boy was okay but as she stood there watching, she felt her head hurt suddenly and groaned in pain.

_“ll… em--”_

“Huh?” she said as she heard a faint voice at the back of her mind

“Are you okay?” Akane asked the older girl who looked like she has a headache “Do you need water or…?”

Tomoe forced a smile and nodded “I’m fine, please don’t worry. I think I just need a rest. Would you be okay taking care of them by yourself?”

“Yes. Please don’t worry and get some sleep inside. I’m sure you’re tired.” Akane escorted her frind back inside and onto the bed. After making sure she was okay, the younger girl went back outside to watch the children.

_“Hu… scre… mak… em…”_

“Ah... It hurts! My head… why?” she tried to keep her voice low despite the stabbing pain she is feeling in her head. She knew it was no ordinary migraine when the voices she is hearing are getting clearer by the minute but she didn’t want to make everyone worry especially since Akane is the only one there and her hands are full with the little ones.

_“Ki… th… ki--”_

She resisted the urge to hit her head on the wall because it was getting unbearable. She was also getting scared- the voices are getting louder and clearer and the words forming aren’t pleasant to hear. “Please make it stop!”

_“AAAAAHHH!!!”_

Her eyes snapped open. The voice she heard wasn’t like the others. It sounds like a person’s voice… someone familiar but she couldn’t place a finger on who it belongs to.

\--

Currently, the kids still on the campus decided to search for their missing companion apparently still roaming in school. They split in another two groups- Kimizuki, Yoichi and Mitsuba for the 1st group and Shinoa, Mika and Yuu for the 2nd- as they searched for Lacus in the school grounds. After almost an hour of searching, they met up at the school gate and concluded that the purple haired boy had already left the campus altogether. “That idiot! Where’d he go off to?” Kimizuki groaned as he looked around the outside of the school gate hoping to see their missing companion close by to no avail.

“He’s probably looking for the thing that killed Rene.” Mika said as he walked over to where Kimizuki stood “Is you leg really okay now? If not, we could go look for him by our--”

“No, I’m fine!” the pink-haired boy cut Mika off “We got to go find him. As much as I hate that bastard, I have to admit that we can’t survive this ordeal by ourselves so we can’t afford to lose anyone anymore.”

“He’s right.” Shinoa and the others went over to them and she continued “We barely made it through the battle earlier and there are four of us. It’s better if we all stick together.”

“Besides, he’s got a weapon now, too.” Mitsuba added

“Yeah…” Mika looked at the items his companions have “Yuu-chan and I still don’t have any though. We can’t fight without them.”

“Don’t worry too much. I’m sure the moment will come when you’d finally get your own weapon but in the meantime,” Shinoa looked at both Yuu and Mika “Please be careful and leave everything to us!”

They didn’t dare split up when they searched the town. A few miles from school, they saw the purple-haired boy walking towards a fastfood joint. They all ran up to him and he stopped when he noticed. “What are you guys doing here?” he asked

“That’s our line!” Mitsuba stepped up and annoyance was visible on her face “Why did you leave campus like that? It’s dangerous to go out alone you know!”

“And you said you’d just be looking around.” Kimizuki walked right next to Mitsuba “I didn’t think that meant getting out of campus and going around town.”

“Yeah…” Lacus looked down and bit his lip “It’s just that I can’t stand by when the thing that took my bestfriend is still out there roaming free!”

“We know how you feel but what would you do if you find it?” Shinoa asked “Are you planning to fight it alone? It took the four of us to beat the monster in school earlier and we didn’t come out unscathed. What do you think you can do alone?”

“She’s right!” Yoichi walked closer to Lacus and said “We should fight together. This… this isn’t just your fight anymore.”

“Why?” Lacus looked at everyone and his eyes went back to Yoichi “You all hate us don’t you? Why would you care?”

“True. We hate you because of what you did back then. But right now, that doesn’t matter.” Kimizuki looked at the older boy in the eyes and said “We can’t survive here by ourselves. Whether we like it or not, we need to stick together and help each other.”

“Correct! Because right now, we’re a team!” Shinoa raised her pointer finger in the air and smiled “Remember, there’s no ‘I’ in ‘team’. We help each other.”

“Okay, okay… you guys are getting f*cking cheesy. I get it.” Lacus gave a slight chuckle

“Well, now that that’s out of the way, what were you doing here, hmm?” Shinoa smirked as she asked the purple-haired boy “We’re you hungry and was going to get a bite to eat? That’s not fair, you should’ve invited us! We’re hungry, too.”

“No! That’s not the reason… ugh! I heard some weird noises inside here earlier so I was gonna check.” Lacus explained

Everyone looked at the fast food joint in front of them. No broken windows but the place looked trashed- overturned tables, chairs lying sideways on the floor, mess of food nearly everywhere and left-overs on some of the table. They deduced that it was probably from the panic yesterday. They went inside to check the place for anything strange but with the state it was in, that would be hard to find.

It was mostly quiet save for the sound of their footsteps and cracks from when they accidentally step on whatever it is that were on the ground. They opened the doors to the toilets, the staff room, kitchen area but nothing was there. “Are you sure you heard something here?” Shinoa asked Lacus who was still looking around.

“Yeah. It was some weird noise- like a bunch of voices and stuff. I swear!”

“Okay, okay… please calm down.” Yoichi said as he put both of his hands up trying to stop things from going bad

“There’s nothing here now though…” Mitsuba started opening drawers behind the counter and even some of the cooking devices

“Well, it might have sensed us and left.” Kimizuki looked outside the glass window “We should move on if that’s the case.”

“It’s close!!... Yes… very close…”

Mika placed his hands on the sides of his head and shut his eyes. His head was hurting and he was starting to hear voices again. He pleaded for them to shut up and not bother him since listening to their direction made them lose a comrade before. He felt something wrap around him and when he finally opened his eyes and looked up, everyone was gathered in front of him and he was locked in a tight hug with Yuu who was rubbing circles on his back trying to calm him. “Are you okay?”

Mika’s cheeks turned slightly pink when he saw how close they were. He pushed Yuu off gently and just held the other’s hand before speaking “Actually, I think I’m hearing voices.”

“Huh? What kind of voices?” Shinoa asked with a serious expression while looking at him straight in the eye

“Creepy voices that are talking all at once and they say the same things. They sound kinda faint but I could hear some words clearly.” His hands automatically held onto his head when the voices started speaking again “It’s been like this since we went to the city hall…”

“What do they keep saying?” Shinoa inquired once more

“Directions… they keep telling me where I should go.” He tried to calm himself after the voices stopped and took a deep breath “A while ago they kept saying that ‘something’ is apparently very close.”

“Something… what could it be?” Mitsuba thought with a finger on her chin

“Whatever it is, it’s probably not a good thing.” Kimizuki went to the door and opened it “We need to move.”

“What?!” Lacus exclaimed “I thought you guys would help me on this? What if that ‘thing’ was what killed Rene?”

“Please calm down.” Shinoa spoke up and looked at the purple haired boy “We’re not saying were running away from ‘it’ but the fact that we don’t know what it is while heading straight to a battle would get us killed as well. You can’t afford to die if you want to get your revenge, right?” she smiles

“We’re just going out to find a good spot to wait at. For all we know, it’s close enough to just grab us.” Mitsuba walked over to where Kimizuki was “We’re sitting ducks here. At least we’d have more space outside.”

Everyone else followed and went outside with Lacus getting out last. They looked at Mika and asked if he’s still hearing voices to which Mika says ‘yes’. As soon as he steps foot outside the door, the voices started talking again saying the same thing they did earlier- that something is close.

They all moved towards the middle of the street, stood close to one another and tried to call on their weapons which worked making them feel uneasy- being able to make their weapons appear meant something bad was going to happen soon. They readied themselves and waited for whatever it was that was coming. Mika and Yuu were behind them- they had no weapon to use and the others are worried that they’d be the first to get attacked. This made Mika feel bad as he wanted to be of help, too. However, he stood by and let them do what they must knowing that he might just get in the way.

He glanced at his side and saw Yuu standing beside him. No trace of fear or worry on his face. In fact, it had a blank expression. It made Mika confused and curious then he thought about it- in every strange situation they were in, he had never seen nor heard Yuu panic. The few times he saw him react differently were when he got angry at Kimizuki for trying to separate them (something which Mika was still confused about) and when Rene had died and he apologized.

Moments went by and they whole group was starting to get tired of waiting. They started questioning whether there was ‘something’ out there after all but before they could completely let their guard down, the ground shook and cracks started forming in the street. The ground split in two and the group was forced to separate lest they fall in the deepening crack. The gap between them got wider and longer which meant they wouldn’t be able to regroup anytime soon. Then they saw things coming up from the gap- monsters. A bunch of them that looked like smaller versions of the ones Shinoa and her group faced earlier. Though not as big as the one they fought since these ones are the height of an average human adult, there are still far too many of them to fend off. The groups ran in opposite directions while trying to bat the creatures away with their weapons.

When they ran far enough from the hordes trying to catch them, they collapsed on the ground and panted from the exhaustion. They looked around to see who’s with whom: Shinoa was with Kimizuki, Lacus and Mika in the middle of a residential area. Mitsuba is now stuck with Yuu and Yoichi near the market area. Before both groups knew it, the creatures are catching up to them so the kids forced themselves to get up, hold their weapons ready and run to an area where they could fight better or at least be safer.

Shinoa waved and twirled her scythe around oncoming enemies ripping them into pieces. Kimizuki did the same and killed them with both swords in hand and Lacus hit his enemies multiple times before they finally fell dead. Mika watched behind them as more and more of them came up. Unbeknownst to him, one of them got past the three fighting on the frontlines and was sneaking up from behind him. When he noticed a shadow looming over him, he turns around to find a monster getting ready to grab him with several vines coming out of it’s back. He froze in place not knowing what to do but when the vines were close into coming in contact with him, he felt something strange- like a tiny jolt of electricity passed through him and for a split second, it seemed like the vines recoiled a little before it even touched him. He couldn’t be sure though as Lacus was suddenly in front of him cutting the vines and Shinoa was attacking it from behind, destroying it. Kimizuki was still fighting off the ones still after them.

Unsure if what he saw was true, he didn’t say a word to anyone.

\--

It didn’t take long for the creatures to catch up to them forcing Mitsuba and her small group to get themselves up from the ground and run. They stop every once and a while to attack when one or two creatures get too close with Mitsuba breaking them with her axe and Yoichi firing off multiple arrows at once. Mitsuba very nearly tripped in the middle of the run but regained her balance before the enemy could take advantage of it. Being weapon-less, Yuu could only watch when one of the creatures charged at him. He placed his arms in front of him protectively waiting for it to hit but when nothing happened, he looked up and saw his attacker in pain from being stabbed by multiple arrows which soon disappeared leaving it injured and bleeding. Yoichi ran to his side, grabbed his wrist and ran off, leaving Mitsuba to finish off the creature Yoichi hit and followed the two boys.

Yuu stared at the hand that held onto his wrist and then stared at it’s owner- Yoichi looked tired and worried but determined. Mitsuba soon ran past them and that’s when Yuu noticed that he was dragging Yoichi down by running too slow so he tried to pick up the pace so he could run alongside them. They ran through corners and several alleyways in an attempt to lose the ones chasing them. They ran inside the bank and hid there seeing as the creatures hadn’t caught up with them yet. Yoichi let go of Yuu’s wrist once inside and they both went to an area where there are no glass windows.

Mitsuba kept a lookout from the bank’s glass doors. They had decided to take refuge here for a while due to exhaustion. They needed a break. Yoichi was on his knees panting with one hand on his chest. He looked at his companions and asked if they were alright. “I’m fine. You?” Mitsuba replied

“I’m fine. Just really, really tired.” Yoichi then looked over to where Yuu was sitting on the floor “Yuu-kun, are you okay?”

Yuu looked up and saw the concern in Yoichi’s face “Yeah… I- I’m okay.”

Yoichi still looked at him with concern, clearly not believing he was alright. Yoichi walked ovr to where he is and crouched down to meet him eye to eye “Are you sure you’re okay? If you have any problems, you can tell us…”

Yuu looked at the other boy and then looked at the wrist which the latter held earlier when they ran off- when Yoichi saved him. He was quiet for a moment, debating on whether or not to ask. Yoichi waited from where he sat until Yuu finally spoke “Actually, I… um,” Yuu sighed “Why did you do that earlier?”

Yoichi gave him a puzzled expression “Huh? Do what, Yuu-kun?”

“Save me. You didn’t have to do that, you know.” When Yuu looked back at Yoichi, the other boy seemed confused and shocked “What?...”

“Eh… actually, you know, that’s a weird question to ask someone.” Yoichi rubbed the back o his head and smiled at Yuu “I saved you because… well, isn’t that what people should do normally?”

“You could’ve just run off on your own you know. You were close to being attacked, too.”

“But I can’t just leave you!” Yoichi looked at him intently “I can’t let my friend get hurt!”

“F-friend?” It was Yuu’s turn to have a puzzled expression on his face “First I’ve heard of that.”

“Well, yeah. I know you might not think so and you think Mika-kun is the only friend you have but we could be your friends too if you give us a chance!” Yoichi took both of Yuu’s hands in his and stared directly in the other boy’s eyes

Yuu looked down. He was speechless- he didn’t think he’d hear that from anyone. He looked at Yoichi and then Mitsuba “I see. I don’t really know what to say to that…”

“How about ‘Thank You’?” Mitsuba finally spoke and looked at Yuu with a grin “Yoichi saved you back there didn’t he?”

Yuu looked at the two and blushed in embarrassment “Oh… uh, Thank you.”

The other two giggled and Yoichi let one of Yuu’s hands go when he covered his mouth when he laughed “No problem!”

“You’re not good at the whole ‘socializing’ thing are you?” Mitsuba said, not actually asking but stating

Yoichi was going to let go of Yuu’s other hand when he noticed something. He carefully pushed back the sleeve of Yuu’s clothes to get a better look at the raven-haired boy’s hands and wrist “I didn’t notice before because of your clothes but Yuu-kun, you’re kinda skinny. I mean really… don’t you eat?”

Mitsuba walked closer to them and sat on her knees to see what Yoichi was talking about “Now that you mentioned it, you’re kinda too short, too. You’re the same age as us, right? I didn’t think I’d see another boy shorter than Yoichi!” she then looked at her friend apologetically “No offense.”

Yoichi shook his head and replied “It’s okay, none taken.”

Yuu took his hand away and pulled down his sleeve so he could cover his hand and then looked away. “Uh, so… what are we going to do now? We can’t stay here forever.”

Seeing as Yuu is trying to change the subject, Yoichi and Mitsuba decided to let the issue slide. Mitsuba replied to his question “Well, we’re just here to take a little break and maybe fix our injuries if we have any. We took some medicines and bandages from the school just in case so…” she took a deep breath “After that, we’d leave and try to get in contact with the other group.”

“Well,” Yoichi inspected himself “I don’t have any major injuries but I do have some scratches. No big deal though! Yuu-kun, how about you?”

Yuu shook his head “It’s the same with me. I only have scratches, too.”

“Okay, we’re all okay aside from scratches and a few small cuts apparently. Let’s put a little medicine on them so they’d be clean anyways.” Mitsuba states after inspecting herself. After that, they cleaned their wounds and waited a few more minutes before deciding to leave.

\--

“I am so tired. We’ve been running for hours!” Lacus complains in between huffs as they try to catch their breath with another break. They hid in one of the houses by climbing the concrete fence that surrounded it. So far, none of the creatures thought of looking for them there.

“Don’t overreact… it hasn’t even been two hours yet.” Kimizuki said as he sat on the floor of the house. He looked at his surroundings and added “We can’t stay here for long. The main gate might be closed but the side door is open which is strange. Something must be up.”

Mika sat down on the floor with his back on the wall “You mean there might be an enemy here?”

“Yeah…” Kimizuki looked up at the ceiling “Might be.”

“Maybe there’s a clue here?” Shinoa said as she peeked out the curtains of the window “Didn’t any of you notice? When they chased after us, they blocked many of the paths that we could’ve taken? I think they might be trying to guide us somewhere… in between trying to kill us all, of course!” she said the last line in a playful tone.  
“So you’re saying they had plans for us?” Kimizuki clicked his tongue “I thought they were mindless…”

“I said ‘I think they might be’. It’s just a hunch. It’ll be troublesome if they are able to think.” Shinoa walked away from the window and to the door. She twisted the knob and pushed “Oh, look… it’s opened.”

The other three stared at the door now ajar. Shinoa hadn’t left her position yet and then turned to look at them as if asking what their plan is now. Lacus took a deep breath and got up, sword in hand. Kimizuki soon followed suit and walked over to where Shinoa stood. Lastly was Mika who followed them as they walked out the door.

The hallway was dark. They tried looking for a switch by the walls near the front door. Kimizuki was the one who found it but before flipping the switch, he asked everyone to move back from the light bulb just in case. When he turned it on, the hallway turned bright but nothing out of the ordinary happened. There were several doors in the first floor and to their right, the stairs leading to the second. They were at the living room earlier so the next to check was the kitchen. Kimizuki made it a point to check for a door which might lead to a basement if this place had one. Next was the bathroom which was clean and nothing strange anywhere and then what seems to be a guest room.

Not finding anything on the first floor, they were planning to climb the stairs to the second one when Mika saw something in the corner of his eye. A small hole could be seen somewhere in the middle of the wall under the staircase. He stopped to inspect it. Looking at it closely, it seemed like the hole is a bit bigger than what it is. The others had stopped to see what Mika was fussing over and noticed the hole as well. “Here.” Lacus said after fishing out a small pin from his pocket. He handed it over to Mika who had thanked him and proceeded to poke at the hole, pulling the pin up and down trying to follow the hole’s shape. Soon, they found themselves a small keyhole.

The others looked at each other and nodded. Finding the edge of the wallpaper cover, the other kids did their best to peel off as much of the decorative paper as they could until they could see nearly the whole door. The doorknob was missing “I guess we need to find the knob and the key.”

“They could be anywhere in this house though. It’ll take us a whole day!” Lacus complained

“Then I suggest we get started.” Kimizuki patted him in the back and went over to the rooms they checked before to see if they missed something.

“Kimizuki and I will be checking down here.” Shinoa said “You two go upstairs. Yell if anything happens.”

\--

Yoichi sat on one of the chairs at the bank. The air conditioning is still on making the place cold so Yoichi was getting uncomfortable chilly. Mitsuba walked over to where he was and said “We have to move now. It’s getting late and we need to find the others.”

“Okay.” Yoichi got up and was walking over to a different direction “I’ll go tell Yuu-kun!”

The brunette looked around the other end of the bank to where he last saw Yuu. He found no one when he looked around in the immediate area making him ask if the raven haired boy is around. Then suddenly he heard a voice. He cautiously followed the voice he’s hearing and he found himself in a small hallway at the back where the offices are. Many of the doors weren’t closed- some were left half-open, there were some fully opened and a few left ajar. As he followed the voice to one of the rooms, he saw a tuft of black hair peeking out from the side of one of the tables.

Feeling relieved, Yoichi took a deep breath and placed a hand on the knob. Before he could call out to Yuu and open the door, he heard him speak: “That was terrible. I actually feel bad about it.” Yuu said with a voice tinged with frustration and irritation. Yoichi looked around the area he could see but there was no one there. He didn’t know if he should call out to the other boy or to wait.

Then Yuu spoke again “It isn’t like that! I-I just thought that maybe I...”

“Oi! Yoichi!” Yoichi gave a yelp and froze when he heard Mistuba calling out to him. Turning around, he saw the blonde girl walked towards him “What’s taking you so long?”

“I, uh...” he said, still looking for the right words to say “I was looking for Yuu-kun.”

“Have you found him then?”

Suddenly, the door next to Yoichi opened up and Yuu came walking out and looked at them “I’m right here.”

“Oh, there you are! We gotta go now.” Mitsuba said and Yuu nodded. The girl left first and the other two soon followed.

Yoichi felt nervous and guilty as he overheard his friend talking but he didn’t know if he should ask. When he glanced to his side, Yuu was staring at him making him more uncomfortable. The latter probably knew he was listening in on him. Yoichi smiled nervously and said “I was gonna check all of the rooms earlier. I was supposed to be the one to tell you we were leaving but I took too long. Sorry! Well, at least you were in the last room anyways.” He gave out a nervous chuckle.  
Yuu looked at him intensely with a glare and asked “So, you... didn’t hear anything?”

“Huh?” Yoichi looked away “Hear what?”

Yuu continued to stare at him making them both stop in their tracks. Yoichi gave the most innocent smile he could muster and after a while, Yuu spoke “Nothing. Forget it.” And soon the raven haired boy kept walking. Yoichi sighed. He felt bad about lying but he didn’t know what he should’ve done. He walked as fast as he could to catch up with the other two and soon, they left their hiding place and proceeded to look for the others.

\--

Kimizuki and Shinoa found several keys in the drawers downstairs. They hurried to the door to check if any of them could fit the keyhole to no avail. Upstairs, the two boys checked separate bedrooms. Lacus went to the room nearest the stairs. The room was pink- a small bed with pink pillows and blanket, pink curtains, even the drawers and closets are all in a different shade of pink. There were also stuffed animals atop the bed. The purple-haired boy shuddered at how girly the room was and started checking the closets. So far, he’s only found female clothing which made him feel awkward. He shook his head and dug underneath the pile of clothes in the drawer just in case there’s something there. So far, only a picture of a male celebrity that he just dumped back in the clothes and a few coins which he kept in his pocket. The closets had clothes and some toys but nothing weird.

He was going to give up and leave when he thought of something. Taking a step back, Lacus went straight to the bed and lifted the pillow and when he found nothing dug under the mattress. When he felt something, he grinned and pulling it out revealed a cute little pink diary with a tiny bronze padlock on one side keeping it locked.

Mika went to the master bedroom. Checking every closet and drawer, he found a few keys but he felt that none of them is what he was looking for. Thinking on it, Mika thought it was strange that the door under the stairs is not only locked but also covered in wallpaper “And the doorknob was taken off, too. They’re probably hiding something…”

He checked the closets and drawers but there weren’t anything strange in them (just maybe some things he’s too embarrassed to touch like underwear or questionable items). So far, he’s got nothing. Getting desperate, he even checked the books he found for clues- there were a few novels, pocket books and albums which has the picture of the people living in the house they’re in. The parents were in the photo with their young daughter who looks to be 10 years old and they look like a happy family. He sighed reminded of his own imperfect family- his real parents who aren’t as kind as the people in the photo book seem to be. He closed the book and resumed his search in the closet when the door suddenly burst open. “Oi, Mika! Look at this…”

Mika got up and ran over to Lacus who held up something that looks like a tiny notebook. Looking closer, it was a pink diary with the cover complete with hearts and flower decorations and with letter stickers on it spelling the owner’s name: ‘Yukie’.

Mika examined the diary and asked “Where’d you get this?”

“The kid’s bedroom… under the mattress.” Lacus placed his hand on his hip looking triumphant “Typical hiding place for stuff.”

“You have the key? There might be a clue in here.” Mika asked another question to lacus who just shrugged and shook his head “How do we open it then?”

“I don’t know…” Lacus scratched his head “Break the lock?”

“That’s kind of…” he wanted to say ‘rude’. Mika thought that they’re already planning to read someone else’s diary- something private and breaking the lock is a bit too much but they had no choice. They were already looking for 2 different items and the key for the diary would be smaller than the 1st two they were supposed to find. “And we don’t even know if this has any clues…”

“Huh?”

“Nothing! I was just talking to myself.” Mika gave a low chuckle and looked at the lock again “How do we do this exactly?”

“Hmm… well,” Lacus held up his sword “Mika, put that down on the floor.”

“Eh? But… that’s too much isn’t it? We could just find something smaller-” seeing as Lacus wouldn’t put his weapon down, Mika did as he was told and watched as the older boy hit the lock with the tip of his sword, breaking it to pieces “Like, I said… it’s too much.”

Mika picked up the diary and opened it. They leafed through the little notebook, trying to find anything that will catch their attention. Written in the diary are everyday things like school events, things about the owner’s friends and a few secrets like crushes but nothing that would help them. Then halfway through, they saw an interesting entry-

____

Dear Diary,  
Mommy and daddy are away right now and my babysitter is watching tv so I just played by myself. I went to mommy and daddy’s room to try on their clothes (Shhh! Don’t tell them!). Their clothes are too big for me but they’re so pretty! Oh and I found a secret! There is a part under their closet that can be opened and inside is a shiny thing. I dunno what that is but it looks like treasure!-

____

They stopped reading after that and checked the closet- they took out all of the clothes at the bottom and looked for an opening. Soon, they found a small hole at one end that would fit a nail and pulled it off and sure enough, there inside is the doorknob. They excitedly ran downstairs and placed it back on the door. Seeing it fit, the two high-fived as their other two companions ran towards them to see what the fuss was about. “You guys found it!” Shinoa said as she twisted the doorknob “Only thing left is the key!”

“Where’d you guys find this?” kimizuki asked

“Inside the master bedroom. There was a secret compartment in the closet!” Mika explained

Lacus triumphantly held up the diary and said “It was written in this. I found this by the way!”

Kimizuki sighed at the older boy’s words “Yeah, great that’s awesome.”

Shinoa took the diary and asked “Did you guys read through a girl’s diary?” she smirked at the two

“I know it’s wrong but this is an emergency!” Mika said with his face flushed with embarrassment

“Y-yeah and we found the doorknob!” Lacus added

Shinoa giggled at their expressions and opened the diary to see if there’s anything else important in it. She found the page the two read earlier and read it through the end. “Did you get the photograph?”

“Eh?” the two looked at her with a confused expression. She knew the answer by then and sighed.

“There was supposed to be a picture alongside the doorknob in the compartment. You guys probably didn’t read the whole entry because you didn’t even know about the picture.”

Lacus immediately ran upstairs to retrieve the photo Shinoa was talking about and ran back down with a picture of a family. Kimizuki looked at each person and said “The guy here is the same as the ones in the pictures around the house but the family is different.”

“What do you think it means?” Mika asked.

Kimizuki turned the picture over and at the back are the words ‘Me, Haruna and our beloved Harumi.’ The pink-haired boy pointed it out to his companions. Shinoa flipped through the diary to find another clue. A few pages later, she found another entry:

____

Dear diary,  
I just remembered about the treasure and the picture so I went back to check it. Mommy left for work again so I thought if I clean up after, I won’t get scolded again. The treasure-thingy is smooth and shiny! I think I saw this somewhere before but I don’t remember. And you know what’s weird? The picture in there had daddy in it but he’s with people I don’t know. The girl in the picture kinda looks like me. I wonder who she is…

____

Flipping to another page, she found this one:

____

I asked mommy if I have a big sister and she got mad at me and asked me why I asked her something like that. I got scared so I lied and said I had a dream about something like that. She said I don’t have one and to never ask her about it again. It was scary and weird!

____

“Either he has a different family his wife knows about or there’s something else here we haven’t figured out.” Kimizuki said “Anything else, Shinoa?”  
Shinoa flipped through more pages which are mostly about the girl’s (named ‘Yukie’) day in school. Then she found another one which talked about the picture and the girl in it.

____

I asked grandma if I have a sister and she was shocked and quiet so I said ‘nevermind’ but she said she’ll tell me. Grandma said that daddy had a different wife back then but she died when she got sick. They had a baby girl who was supposed to be my big sister and she was the same age as me when daddy married my mommy. He went to work far away like he is doing now and they said big sister was sad and angry because he left her behind so she ran away. They haven’t found big sister yet so I couldn’t meet her. Grandma said not to tell mommy that she told me about it. Oh and my big sister’s name is Harumi!  
____

She flipped over more pages but there were no more clues to be found. Closing the book, Shinoa gave an irritated sigh and said “Okay, so the girl in the picture is Yukie’s missing sister and this is apparently the father’s first family. What now?”

Kimizuki examined the picture again and looked at the background- the three people in the picture were all sitting on small chairs (most likely for children) and the floor was covered in those colourful foam puzzle. There were also toys all around them “What room is this?”

The other three looked at the picture as well. None of them recognize the room. “You think they moved houses?” Shinoa asked

Before they could answer, Kimizuki suddenly exclaimed “Wait! Look at the walls and the windows.” They examined the picture once more and sure enough, it was familiar to them.

“That kind of looks like the guest room here.” Shinoa pointed at the door a few meters from them “You think we’d find the key there?”

Kimizuki shrugged “We’ll just have to try and see. It’s the only clue we have after all.”

Shinoa was the first to re-enter one of the rooms they had inspected earlier. It was the guest room which had a bed and few furnishing inside which is quite the difference from what it used to be back then. There wasn’t anything reminiscent of the playroom where the missing girl played. “What should we look for exactly? Where do we find the key in this place?” Lacus asked as his eyes darted across the room while absent-mindedly looking underneath some of the vases he passed by.  
“This place is probably cleaned up before it was turned into a guest room so we can’t expect anything from the new furniture so maybe there is another secret compartment here…” Shinoa said as she knocked on the walls, hoping to find any hollow spaces.

Everyone else decided to find any place where something could be hidden. Kimizuki even searched underneath the rug covering the floor. Mika borrowed the picture from Shinoa so he can see if there was anything on it that stands out. He compared the picture to the room and saw it- on the top right corner of the picture is a painting and looking at the room now, the same painting can be found. Standing in front of it, it was a simple painting of a vase of colourful flowers. He grabbed a chair to reach it and saw the signature of the painter at the bottom- ‘Haruna’. Mika read the writing at the back of the family photo and the mother’s name is the same as the signature on the painting and had the same characters. “She probably made this herself.”

He took the painting off the wall and examined it. Nothing in particular stands out- it’s just a normal painting. He carefully placed the painting on the ground and checked the wall it was hanged in. There he saw a small slot but he couldn’t fit even his nail in it. “Uh, guys, a little help please?”

Everyone dropped what they were doing to see what Mika was looking at. The blonde pointed out the slot and told them of his problem. They checked the room and their pockets for anything that could help but there were none. “I think there’s something we could use there…” Kimizuki muttered to himself before bolting out the door. Everyone stared at the doorway and waited for the boy’s return. When the pink haired boy came back, he was walking fast instead of running back and for a good reason- he now has a small knife in his hand “Try this. It’s thinner and the tip is small enough to fit.”

He carefully hands the knife to the blonde who carefully inserted the tip in the slot and used it to push the cover of the hidden compartment open. He smiled when the small area is opened and handed the knife back to Kimizuki who carefully placed it on the nearby table. The small rectangular hole was only big enough to let his hand fit. He dug his hand in and pulled out whatever item he felt inside- it was another small notebook but this time, it’s purple. “Another diary…” he said as he jumped off the chair he was standing on.

The others gathered around him to look at their new find. The purple diary was a simple spiral notebook with a latch at one side as it’s lock. The cover has small flower stickers decorating it and a name nicely handwritten: ‘Harumi’. They all looked at each other and gave one nod as if saying they’re ready to find out whatever was inside. It was easier to open as it didn’t require a key. Mika flipped through the pages and read the things that might help them understand what’s going on and maybe help them.

____

12-25-XX  
It’s Christmas and my mom decided to give me this diary. She’s in the hospital right now and is trying to recover from sickness so I couldn’t see her all the time. She said that if I get lonely and I wanted to talk to her, I just have to write on my diary and someday, she’ll read everything in here.

-

01-15-XX  
My cousins visited a few days ago and nearly read my diary. I’m not sure where I should hide it where they won’t be able to see. I told my mom about it when I visited yesterday and told me of some special hiding places where I could keep this safe. It was pretty cool what were in this house and mom said that my dad’s sister- my aunt- told her of them back then when my parents haven’t gotten married yet. They were very good friends and auntie told mom that she shouldn’t tell anyone else of their little secret- except me, of course! So now I’m hiding this diary somewhere on my playroom.  
____

Mika leafed through the pages that are undoubtedly just slice-of-life stuff about the girl. Then he found the page where Harumi wrote about her mother’s death- everyone else was uneasy about reading it so they skipped the page as well. Soon, they got to the answer to one of their questions. As they read through the diary, the entries become more and more worse.  
____

06-21-XX  
My dad and his girlfriend got married. I’m so happy for them! I was the bridesmaid and my dress was so pretty! (Not as pretty as the dress of my new mom though). They left for their honeymoon so my grandma is here to watch over me until they come back.

-

09-05-XX  
Dad left early for his plane ride. He’d be living abroad for months because of his new job. I’m really sad but I have to understand that he’s doing this for us. Also, I was told that mother is pregnant! I’m gonna be a big sister so it’s no time to be sad.

-

09-22-XX  
Mother had been acting strange lately. She gets mad easily and sometimes she even hits me but I think it’s because of the stress. I mean she’s gonna have a baby soon and dad isn’t here. I should just try to understand her. It’s not easy taking care of the household alone. I have to learn how to cook now, though as she wouldn’t cook anything for me anymore.

-

05-06-XX  
It’s been a few months since my baby sister, Yukie was born. She’s really cute but she cries a lot. Mother wouldn’t allow me near Yukie, though. She said she would never let me near Yukie. I don’t know why. I told her I’d be a good big sister but she just shouted at me.

-

08-25-XX (This entry has a few small red stains on some part of the page)  
It hurts. Mother keeps hurting me. I’m being a good girl but she keeps shouting at me and telling me that I’m not her daughter. She’s becoming really scary. She told me not to tell on her or she’ll hurt me more. Auntie visited today and when she saw my injuries, mother told her that I was being clumsy so I got hurt. I’m scared.  
____

Mika froze on the spot and stared at the page in front of him. ‘It’s blood…’ he thought as he kept staring at the red stains on this page and on the next one as well. His hands were shaking and he felt cold. His friends noticed the grim expression on his face and asked if he was alright but he didn’t respond as if he didn’t her them. Kimizuki shook the blonde’s shoulders snapping the latter out of his thoughts. Mika saw everyone’s concerned faces and took a deep breath before speaking “I’m sorry. Um, where was I…” he said, looking back at the diary.

Kimizuki held the diary preventing Mika from seeing the page and said “Forget that! What’s wrong with you? You were acting weird earlier! Are you even okay?”  
“And don’t say that it was nothing because it definitely wasn’t.” Shinoa added

“I’m sorry, I just remembered something.” Mika said in a sorrowful tone

“What was it?” Lacus asked. Mika didn’t say anything for a while, debating on whether he would answer the question or not.

“It’s fine.” Kimizuki said “If you’re not comfortable with it, then you don’t have to tell us. We all have secrets that aren’t easy to talk about.”

Shinoa nodded and smiled “Yep and you can tell us when you’re ready! Although…” she then looked at Kimizuki and grinned “That wasn’t what you told Yuu-san last night. You got mad at him because he didn’t want to talk. My, my… being a hypocrite now, aren’t we?”

Kimizuki’s face turned red in both embarrassment and annoyance and glared at Shinoa “Wha- but that’s… Argh! This and that are two different things, okay?!”

Shinoa, still sporting that annoying grin, continued to tease the tall boy “Really? I don’t see the difference. Unless… you have different reason. Like…” she looks over at Mika then back at Kimizuki “Do you swing that way?”

Kimizuki stared at her, mouth agape and then the shock turned to anger “What the f*ck?! I do not you f*cking midget and what does that have anything to do with this?!”

“Oh my, being so defensive… it does have something to do with this since you seem to have a favoritism between those two so I thought maybe you like one better than the other. Or are you a tsundere?”

“That’s not the reason at all! That other kid was shady as hell and… ugh.” Kimizuki raised his hands in defeat “You know what, never mind. I’m tired of this!”

They suddenly heard a giggle and looked at Mika whose now trying to contain his laughter. They smiled as well when they saw that the blonde seemed to be feeling much better than he did a few moments ago “I’m sorry but are you guys always like this?” he asked, wiping the tear from the corner of his eye.

“Usually… because Shinoa can be a total weirdo.” Kimizuki said as Shinoa elbowed him

“Well, it looks like you’re feeling better now.” She points out

“You know…” Lacus finally spoke up “Someone else can read the diary if you’re not comfortable with it.”

Mika shook his head and with a smile replied “I’ll do it. I’m okay now. Thank you.” He turned his attention back to the diary to continue reading another entry and similar to the last page they read from and it was clear that the girl’s step-mother disliked her.

____

03-02-XX  
Mother has talked with father over the phone and had convinced him to turn the playroom into a guestroom. I begged for her to change her mind but she wouldn’t listen. I asked her to at least leave mother’s painting as it was the last thing she gave dad before she was admitted to the hospital. Father would be very upset if it was gone. I’m glad that she had listened to at least that.

-

05-24-XX  
Mother was planning to turn my room into Yukie’s room. Where would I sleep if she did that? I don’t understand at all. It’s as if I don’t have a place here anymore. Mother was kind when I first met her but now… maybe it was all a lie after all. Maybe she never loved me from the start.

-

05-27-XX  
Mother started cooking me meals again. They taste kind of strange but I’m not complaining. Maybe she’s getting back to normal. Maybe she’ll be my mom again.

-

07-05-XX  
I feel sick. Very sick. I don’t know why. Mother said I might be getting sick like my real mother. Strange though because I was told my mom’s sickness isn’t the kind that gets passed on to their child.

-

10-07-XX  
I walked downstairs earlier to get myself a glass of water and found mother cooking in the kitchen. I hid and saw her pouring something weird on the food she’s making. She gave the same food to me for dinner. I didn’t eat it and threw it away and just pretended to eat it. She’s trying to kill me. What do I do? Somebody please help me…

____

That was the last entry. The rest of the pages remained blank. They remembered reading in Yukie’s diary that her older sister ran away and went missing but could that be true? Deep inside, there’s a nagging feeling that says Harumi didn’t run away but she did disappear and what ‘disappear’ means in this is something they didn’t want to think about.

Suddenly, they heard a clicking sound. They looked at each other as if asking what they should do. Kimizuki was the first to answer “It came from the hallway. We have to check it out either way.”

They slowly walked outside the guestroom, holding their weapons and being on their guard. Looking around, there seemed to be nobody else there except for them. Then Lacus noticed it “Look! There’s a key in the door.”

They all ran towards the locked door which now has the key they’ve been searching for already in the keyhole. Shinoa twisted it and they heard a ‘click’. She then twisted the doorknob and pushed the door open. Kimizuki went in first and pulled the string to turn on the lights. When the room was finally illuminated, they found stairs leading to the basement “F*cking great! Another basement.” He exclaimed as he remembers what happened when he went to a basement yesterday and Yoichi’s story about the school basement.

“Oh…” Shinoa grinned at his direction “Are you scared?”

“Shut up!” he said as he went down first followed by Shinoa, then Lacus and Mika following behind them. Kimizuki pressed the light switch on the wall on his left and the rest of the basement was now properly illuminated. Many items could be found here and many of them are undoubtedly Harumi’s belongings- the things from both her room and the playroom. He immediately searched around for any signs of an enemy but couldn’t find one.

“What are we looking for now exactly?” Lacus asked as he roamed the place while looking at all the things in dumped in the basement.

“That’s…” Shinoa opened some of the drawers at the back of the room only to find toys “Well, I’m not really sure. I mean I thought there would at least be something waiting for us down here.”

Kimizuki sighed as he scratched the back of his head “As much as I don’t want to have to fight anything right now, a part of me actually wishes there was something waiting for us. We’re at a dead end if there wasn’t anything here.”

“Then why were we lead here?” Shinoa asked. Then they heard a strange noise nearby. Turning to the direction of the sound, they see Mika move the tables in the middle of the room and after that proceeded to take a big shovel from the closet at the far corner of the room and dig through the cement covered floor. Everyone walked over to where he is.

“What are you doing?” Kimizuki asked the blonde but got no response

“Hey, can you hear us?” Lacus asked as well but still no response

“Um… Mika-san, the floor is covered in cement. You can’t possibly-” before Shinoa could finish, Mika had successfully cracked the floor and to their shock, continue to do so until the dirt underneath could be seen. “Okay… that’s unexpected but what exactly are you trying to do?”

“Are you okay? You haven’t answered any of our questions! What the hell is up with you?” Kimizuki grabbed hold of Mika’s shoulders and had the blonde face him. He looked into the blondes eyes and it unnerved him- Mika’s eyes were dull- he stared at Kimizuki with a blank expression. The pink-haired boy immediately let go and Mika continued what he was doing. After a while, something appears to be under the dirt. Mika threw the shovel away and started digging with his hands while the others continued to watch.

They all went wide eyed when most of the dirt was taken off revealing something disturbing and answering a question they had from the beginning. Under the dirt was a corpse belonging to a female.

\--

Mika woke up with a headache. Getting up from the floor, Mika observed his surrounding- a small messy room with a broken window and there were clothes and a few books strewn everywhere. He was confused as the last thing he remembers was going down the stairs to the basement of a certain house he and his friends are trying to investigate and now, he’s here. He got up to look outside the window and to his surprise, he remembers the place- it was his old neighborhood. He turned around to face the room. The more he looked around, the more it was making sense and the more uneasy he feels. The room he is currently in was his room, the room he used in his old house when he was still living with his parents.

“Why am I here?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still working on the next chapter. Major writer's block because I didn't have enough inspiration XD
> 
> And the diary bit of this chapter was inspired by several rpg maker horror games I've played. Reading info can help if you're stuck in a game! :)


	7. Chapter 7- One by One (Part 3)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What they uncovered in the basement has now become their problem. Meanwhile, everyone is back on their way to being reunited but would it be enough to stop their enemy?
> 
> And Mika confronts his past in the strangest way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the very late update. It took me so long to think about how to finish this because as I mentioned before, I suck at battle scenes. Also, our laptop stopped working (lost a bunch of files) and I had to rewrite this on my little sister's laptop (which I can't always borrow so I'll try saving up for a cheap one for myself... if it's even possible).
> 
> It'll be a while before I can post a new chapter so I'm sorry to those who are reading this.

Mika looked out the window. It was the old neighborhood he lived in when he was little. Seeing his reflection on the window, he realized that not only was he back at his old house, he now went back into looking like a child- the same way he did when he had lived here. Examining himself, there were more than a few scratches and bruises on him which reminded him of his parents’ ill treatment of him back then.

He decided to look around for any clues on how to get back. Twisting the doorknob, Mika got to open the door easily. He checked every room on the 2nd floor but found nothing of importance but he did notice that nothing was locked with the exception of drawers in his parents’ room which probably held important items or documents which is normal. So far, nothing had tried to attack him yet. Carefully walking down the stairs, Mika heard voices. There are other people here… and he didn’t want to admit it but at the back of his mind, he knew they’d probably be here.

Walking towards the kitchen and peeking from the corner of the doorway, he saw them sitting on the chairs in front of the table just staring blankly in space. The blonde-haired woman a smile on her face while the dark-haired man opposite her looked weary but annoyance marked his face. His hunch was right, they are here.

The other people inside the house with him are his parents. Or at least, replicas of them. They looked the same as he remember them all those years ago as if they’ve never aged a day since.

Stepping inside the kitchen, the two other people finally moved to turn and look at him making the blonde freeze in his tracks.

“Oh, Mikaela! You’re finally awake.” Said his mother. She tilted her heard and her smile widened into something that sent shivers down Mika’s spine “Come on sweetie, were going somewhere special today.”

\--

A few blocks away from the bank where they hid earlier, Mitsuba’s group suddenly encountered giant spider-like creatures with red-eyes. The spider demons came after them in groups forcing the kids to run away as fast as they could. Whenever they try to run to a corner, more of the demons show up. Feeling themselves getting tired, Mitsuba ran towards one of the houses and pulled the other two with her letting them hide behind some of the bushes in the house’s front yard. The demons ran past them and when they were sure their pursuers are gone, the children let out a sigh.

“We just had our break and now we’re already exhausted!” Mitsuba groaned as she laid on the ground.

“Yeah… there were so many of them!” Yoichi said as he sat on the ground with the wall on his back “What do we do now?”

“Look for the others and regroup, of course!” Mitsuba exclaimed “We can’t handle those things by ourselves. In fact… I don’t think that we could handle them even if we are together with the others. But at least we’d have a better chance.”

“I wonder how the others are doing right now? Maybe they’re being chased, too.” Yoichi pondered. There were a lot of demons so it’s not unlikely for Shinoa’s group to encounter them as well.

Mitsuba stared at the late afternoon sky. It was going to be dark soon and they have to get back to their secret base. Yoichi’s sisters and the other children must be worried about them. “We need to go.”

“Yeah… it’s going to be night time soon.” The brunette said sadly “It’s going to be two days already, huh?”

The blonde girl sat up and looked at Yoichi “You’re right, tomorrow, it’s going to be day 3 and we still don’t have any idea why this is happening. We don’t even know what is happening.”

“Mom and dad were out of town when this began yesterday.” Yoichi explained “My sister was gonna pick me up from school and it would be just the two of us at home. I wonder what our parents are doing, right now. I wonder if they are looking for us or if they couldn’t get back here in town. Maybe our fakes went ahead to meet them so they’ll never look for us.” Tears started to fall from his eyes as he thought of the possibilities.

“Yoichi…” Mitsuba went over to the brunette and sat next to him. Wrapping her arms around the boy, she said “It’s okay, Yoichi. We’d get out of this so stop crying.”

“I’m sorry, I’m just…” Yoichi wiped away his tears with the back of his hands “I’m just worried about mom and dad.”

“I know.” The blonde girl planed her hands on her knees “We’re all worried about our families. Even though they’re not in this hellhole right now, who knows what might happen to them outside. Especially since those fakes are probably out there impersonating us.”

The two looked to their right when they heard leaves rustling. In front of the tree near the house is Yuu, standing up and absent-mindedly staring at the flowers blooming on the plants in front of him. “Yuu-kun, is anything wrong?” Yoichi asked “You’ve been quiet all this time.”

“Huh?” Yuu looked back at them “Oh, it’s nothing. I’m fine.”

“I know you said you’re not close with your dad but… aren’t you sad that your parents aren’t here. Even a little?” Mitsuba asked, half-concerned, half-curious. Thinking back on it, Kimizuki had a point- they don’t know anything much about Yuu and the boy is pretty strange. Even at this moment, unlike them, Yuu didn’t seem at all concerned about their situation.

“No.” Yuu replied quickly

“Why?” Yoichi asked “Is your relationship with your dad really that bad?”

Yuu looked away without answering. Yoichi dropped the issue and apologized “I’m sorry, it’s probably personal, huh?”

“Well…” Mitsuba said to get their attention “We really must go now and fine everyone. We can’t walk around here at night.”

Yoichi stood up and helped Mitsuba stand as well, dusting the grass and dirt off of herself. Yuu walked over to them and they all walked out the gate. Mitsuba looked around “They don’t seem to be here.”

“So, where are we going?” Yoichi asked as he worriedly looked around as well.

“To the right, I guess? We came from the left and our friends weren’t there.” Mitsuba answered. Activating her weapon, she started walking towards the right “Come on.”  
Yoichi activated his weapon as well and followed suit with Yuu trailing beside him.

\--

Shinoa and her friends looked up and watched as a corpse demon flew above them. It flew in circles in the sky and only swooped down whenever any of them tries to run away from the areas near the house. Laying the unconscious Mika on the ground, the group sat down and watched the demon from the empty lot one block away from the house it had come from.

Looking at Mika, Kimizuki had wondered what had happened to the blonde earlier. The other boy suddenly dug on the floor with enough force to break the concrete and reveal a corpse which probably belonged to Harumi- the owner of the diary who might have been killed by her step-mother. Mika suddenly collapsed after the body was dug out and soon, the corpse started to move on it’s own and reattach its bony limbs on it’s decaying body. It stood up and stared at them with hollow eye sockets and soon walked towards them. With Kimizuki carrying Mika on his back, the group ran outside the house with the undead corpse walking after them. As soon as it got out, bony bat-like wings sprouted from it’s back and now, it’s up there flying around- waiting for them to try and leave before attacking.

“It’s keeping us here for some reason.” Shinoa said “I wonder why…”

“It might be waiting for something.” Kimizuki replied.

“That thing is too fast and it flies. How do we kill it?” Lacus asked. They watched the demon flying over them again, still circling the vicinity around the house it came from.

“If only Yoichi was here, he could shoot that thing down and make things easier for us.” Shinoa said.

“Yeah.” Kimizuki thought “I wonder where they are right now. I hope they’re faring better than we are.”

“There’s only 2 fighters in their team, though so they might be in even worse situations though.” Lacus replied.

“Shut up and don’t say sh*t like that!” Kimizuki exclaimed “Mitsuba and Yoichi aren’t weak, you know. And… I don’t want to think of the worst.”

“Hey.” Lacus put up his hands “I’m just saying. So… we wait for the other team, then?”

“We should.” Shinoa answered “But it’s getting late. It’s going to be nightfall soon and we can’t stay here that long.”

“Then we need to think of another plan. Maybe there’s--“ before Kimizuki could finish his sentence, they heard footsteps coming towards them from behind. With their weapons at the ready, the three kids waited for whatever it was to get to the vacant lot and readied themselves for a fight. To their relief, what stood in front of them are Mitsuba and her group. Yuu immediately saw Mikaela unconscious on the ground and quickly ran towards him.

“Guys!” Mitsuba exclaimed, running towards them. Looking at Mika whose head is now resting on Yuu’s lap, she asked “What happened to him? Is he okay?”

Yoichi ran off and quickly grabbed Kimizuki and Shinoa be their necks and hugged them close “I’m so glad to see you guys again! And is Mika-kun okay?”

“Us, too Yoichi.” Shinoa said “Long story but how about you guys? What happened to you and how did you guys find us?”

Yoichi finally let them go and answered “We hid in a bank after we got separated but when we went out to look for you guys again, those spider demons started running after us.”

“They were everywhere!” Mitsuba exclaimed “Well, they were earlier. They stopped running after us somewhere around here then we saw that thing flying up there.” She said, pointing up at the corpse demon “So we ran towards here thinking you guys might have something to do with that. We were right.”

“Haha totally.” Shinoa replied “I’m glad you guys are here. We kinda need you for our plan to beat that thing.”

“I see.” Mitsuba said “What is that thing anyways?”

With that, the two groups exchanged stories and told the other what had happened in their separation. Yoichi debated on whether they’d tell them about what happened regarding Yuu’s behavior at the bank earlier but decided against it. Kimizuki and Yuu aren’t on best terms with each other as is, Yoichi didn’t want to make it worse.

“I hope Mika-kun is okay…” Yoichi said. He sat beside Yuu to try to comfort the worried boy “It’s gonna be okay Yuu-kun. If we beat that demon, he might wake up again.”

Mitsuba watched as Yuu stroked Mika’s hair as he stared at him with worry. It was different from the blank expression Yuu had earlier when they were talking about their families. It made her wonder more about the connection between the two boys. With that aside, she finally asked Shinoa “What do we have to do, then?”

Shinoa cleared her throat and proceeded to explain her plan which is to have Yoichi go up on the rooftop to try and hit the flying demon while the others wait on the ground and attack when it falls. She would go with Yoichi just in case the demon tries to attack him and need back-up. With no other plan in mind, they all agreed with her and left running towards the demon’s house. Shinoa then told Yuu to stay with Mika and watch over him.

After they have left, Yuu felt Mika stir but instead of waking up, the blonde whimpered and had a pained expression on his face but stayed unconscious. Yuu shook him to see if he would wake up to no avail. Yuu grabbed onto Mika’s hand to try to calm him and there he saw it- pulling the sleeves down, Yuu saw the blonde’s hand slowly turning black. Checking the boy’s other hand, he saw that it was the same. It was slow but it doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt and seeing Mika in pain was making Yuu panic. The raven-haired boy hugged the blonde close, hoping that Mika would be okay.

\--

Mika was feeling restless riding on the car’s passenger seat next to his mother who gripped his hand painfully tight as his father drove. He desperately wanted the car to stop so he could leave. The sun is out and it was midday. He looked outside and saw the peaceful passing scenery but nothing could calm him down at this very moment. He still remembers the day his real parents tried to kill him- the fear he felt as his mother opened the door in the passenger’s side of the car as she tried to coax him to jump on his own free will while the car was still running, how blurry everything went as he was finally pushed out by his mother and the pain he felt when his little body hit the ground as he saw his parents’ car drive away before he finally blacked out. It was the day he finally accepted that his parents are very messed up people who probably never loved him as much as they told him.

This situation is a near replication of that horrible day with the exception him already knowing what would happen next and the twisted, inhuman smile his mother wore on her face. He didn’t know what he should do- even if he opened the door at this moment, it’s not as if he would just jump out because it was exactly what he didn’t want to happen.  
His fear grew more as he looked out the window and see some familiar place – he knew that sooner or later, his mother is going to open the car door to push him out. And this time, he might not survive.

A few miles later, his mother pushed the door open and held onto him while saying “Jump for mommy, Mika!”

“No… I don’t want to!” Mika held onto the side of the door as his mother started to give him a push.

“Don’t be scared, Mika! It’s going to be okay… just jump out. Do it for mommy and daddy!” she said “You love us don’t you?”

With tears starting to fall from his eyes, Mika shouts “No!”

His mother stopped for a moment before gripping his shoulders tightly “What do you mean ‘no’? Don’t you love us?” She said with a hint of anger in her voice, the smile she had on disappearing “Mommy and daddy loves you! That’s why we’re doing this…”

“Liar!” he screams. His mother then tried to push him off but he turned around, enough to grab hold of his mother’s arm tight enough. She tries to shake him off but that only gave him to hold on to her arm with his other hand as well. He knew his mother wouldn’t let herself fall off as well so as long as he’s holding onto her, there’s a higher chance of him not falling off.

\--

After taking multiple shots at the demon who could quickly dodge most of his arrows, Yoichi felt exhausted. Not only had his shots miss more than once but even when hit, the demon’s pace never gets any slower and it’s still as fast as it was before they even tried to fight it. Shinoa was equally getting exhausted from protecting Yoichi whenever the demon decides to fly over to them in retaliation. Surprisingly though, even after several attacks, all Yoichi and Shinoa got were a few scratches and bruises.

“I’m sorry.” Yoichi uttered in between exhausted pants. He puts his weapon up again as he tried to aim at the flying enemy.

“It’s okay. You’re doing great, Yoichi-san!” Shinoa replied “It’s just this thing… It doesn’t seem to care at all about the wounds we inflict. I guess maybe it’s because it’s already dead… probably.”

“How could we beat it then?” Yoichi asked as he shot 3 more arrows at the demon, one of which hit it’s knee while the other two grazed hit’s arms “At this rate, it would probably kill us.”

“I know but…” then something hit Shinoa- the demon had attacked them multiple times now. It had even tried to attack their friends below but so far, nothing serious had happened. They’ve never received any fatal wounds- only scratches and bruises. The only reason they were starting to feel weak was because of exhaustion and possibly hunger and thirst since the last time they ate was this morning at breakfast and a lot has happened since then. Shinoa told Yoichi to try hitting the demon again continuously until it attacks them. The brunette did as was told and soon, the demon had its eyes set on them as it flew at their direction to attack.

It lunges at them, trying to push either of the children down the roof or just clawed at them and Shinoa hits it back with her scythe which let her both attack and defend. After a while, the demon gives up again and flies away, going back into its routine of circling the sky. Meanwhile, through shaky and exhausted breath, the purple-haired girl called off her scythe as she instructed the boy to put his weapon down and stop attacking for a while.

She then got down from the rooftop but told Yoichi to stay and wait as she gets someone else to take her place. Running towards the first person she could get hold of, she told Kimizuki to go to Yoichi and assist him while she sorted something out. When she was sure the two boys are already together, Shinoa ran back to the empty lot.

When she finally got there, she was greeted by the sight of a raged Mika attacking Yuu. She saw half the blonde’s hand which are wrapped around Yuu’s neck starting to blacken and his eyes were crimson red and the rest of his eyeballs are black. Shinoa proceeded to try to pry Mika’s hands off Yuu’s neck but the grip was too strong. Not having any other choice, the purple-haired girl held Mika’s left arm as she bit on his wrist making the blonde let go of Yuu’s neck in pain which gave the other two time to escape.

Yuu looked back as he ran with Shinoa. The girl knew that despite what had just happened, the raven-haired boy was still worried about his friend. “He had been possessed earlier.” She said as they ran, getting Yuu’s attention “We thought it was over when he passed out after digging out the dead girl’s corpse but it seems it isn’t.”

Running towards one of the houses, Shinoa didn’t waste any time trying to open the locked door and activated her weapon with the intent of breaking the door down. There was no time for manners and she sliced the door easily and ran inside to look for anything to use as a rope. Yuu followed after her to help and both decided to take the bed sheets and blankets to use as make shift ropes to immobilize their possessed friend who might undoubtedly be after them.

“How did you know Mika was still possessed?” Yuu asked as he grabbed the bundles of folded up white blankets from the closet “And why are you here? Aren’t you supposed to be fighting alongside the others?”

“I was but…” Shinoa said as she tied the blankets Yuu held together until it had become a long rope “I noticed that no matter how much we hit that demon, it wouldn’t fall plus it hadn’t killed us. Specifically, it couldn’t- it’s a freaking decaying corpse so it was weak. But so then I thought, why was it doing what it does? What’s its goal? Then it hit me- it was buying time. Mika-san went unconscious the same time it awakened. So, I just put two and two together.”

“It’s trying to possess Mika completely, then?” Yuu asked and the girl nods in response.

When they finally got out of the house, Mikaela was already standing in front of the gate looking dead straight at them. With the two holding on each of the ‘ropes’ ends, they carefully walked towards the blonde on opposite sides. When they finally got a few inches closer, they gave each other a nod before sprinting towards the other boy trying to wrap the makeshift rope around his arms. The blonde fought back as he struggled to get out of their grip and the bindings. In the struggle, Yuu managed to grab hold of Mika in which the other boy responded by biting down the side of Yuu’s left shoulder, hard enough to draw blood. Yuu held the other boy tighter in a sort of hug, trying to ignore the pain as Mika continued to bite him. The dark-haired boy just motioned for Shinoa to continue tying the blonde up. Mika finally lets go to hiss at Shinoa and Yuu held him tighter.  
As Shinoa tied the blankets’ ends as tightly as she could, Yuu placed his hands on Mika’s hair, pulling the other boy close, whispering pleas for him to return to normal.

_“Please… help Mika.”_

Shinoa could’ve sworn she felt something strange after she had successfully tied the boy up. For a few seconds, the air around them felt heavy but it soon disappeared.  
Shrugging the strange feeling off, she looks up to see that Mika was unconscious again in Yuu’s arms. “Are you okay?” she asked, staring in concern at Yuu’s bleeding shoulder.

“I’m fine.” Yuu replied with a pained smile “It’s not that bad.”

“I see…” Shinoa said, not believing a word but let it go. They still didn’t know what to do about Mika. Before she could talk to Yuu, they heard screams. Shinoa looked at Yuu who gave her a nod as if saying she should go.

When she got to where the voices came from, she saw that the demon was now in a frenzy trying it’s best to kill Kimizuki and Yoichi who were fighting back. Shinoa wasted no time in getting up to help them. Meanwhile, both Mitsuba and Lacus who also heard the boys’ distress calls were on their way to help.

“Why did this thing go insane all of a sudden?” Kimizuki asked Shinoa “What the f*ck did you do?”

In between trying to hit and defend themselves against the demon, Shinoa explained as quickly as she could “Mika-san is still possessed and he attacked Yuu-san. We tied him up with ropes and he’s now unconscious. The real demon was inside him all along and this thing here is only buying time.”

“You knew that and didn’t tell anyone?!”

“I wasn’t entirely sure!” Shinoa exclaimed “Besides, I needed you guys to be here just in case. It worked out anyway, didn’t it?”

“This is working out?” Yoichi asked as he dodges attacks aimed at him. He can’t exactly use his long-ranged weapon with the enemy this close.

“Are you guys okay?!” Mitsuba asked as she and Lacus looked up at the rooftop where her friends are fighting “Should we go up there?”

Pushing the demon away from her and letting it be distracted by Kimizuki, Shinoa answers “Actually, just stay down there. There’s not enough space here for this…” she was cut off when the demon started trying to attack her again, making her jump back carefully, just enough so she doesn’t fall off. Using her scythe, she got to slice its arm off easily, letting it fall to the ground below.

Mitsuba and Lacus stepped back as they let the arm fall right in front of them. Wary of the decapitated arm, Lacus pushed it a bit with his sword. When it gave a little twitch, Mitsuba hits it with her axe in a panic, chopping it off in two. It soon disappeared, turning into black smoke.

“I guess it’s less powerful when it’s not connected to its body.” Mitsuba then looks up and shouts “Hey, guys! Hack it to pieces and throw the parts down here! We can make them disappear with our weapons if it’s far away from it’s body!”

Kimizuki and Shinoa glanced at each other and gave a nod “Roger that!”

\--

In a place which replicated the dimly lit basement of the now dead Harumi’s house stood a lone figure in the middle. The girl’s soul (if you could still call it that what with its blackened rotting skin, left eye bleeding some kind of oil, sharp teeth and red pupils looking as if something else had merged with her) stood waiting. The light of the room seem to come out of nowhere around her. The girl turns around to meet her visitor.

“You…” she muttered “How did you get here?”

The figure a few feet in front of her in the darkness, which stood at a height which is probably a few inch taller than her, gave no answer. She stared at it and soon realized “You’re here for ‘him’, aren’t you?” she said “He… he was just like me in a way. We were lied to, we were hurt but… but we did nothing wrong!”

“The world is mean…” she cried “They were mean. My step-mother who lied to my father and made a new family with him taking me out of the picture. And my father who never questioned her pitiful excuse and accepted that I was gone for good. They were terrible.”

The figure in front of her slowly took a few steps before stopping at where the dim light begins letting it stand near the borderline of light and darkness. Still not seeing her visitor, Harumi continued “He’s like that, too! His parents lied to him and left him for dead. He was lucky to have survived but I’m sure he’s still in pain.”

“We’re the same and he’s the only one who could understand me!” she exclaimed “His broken heart is the only one I could seep in through… his body, I need it to return. He’d understand… he knows how I feel so he’d understand….”

The other person finally took a step forward in the light, revealing itself in front of her. It slowly walked towards her making her step back. “You! You’re just like us… you’re the same so why? Why are you doing this? You should understand me and just let me do this!”

As it placed both hands on her neck, she looked at it straight in the eyes and soon she was hit with understanding. Suddenly letting out a burst of laughter, she spoke “You hypocrite! You’re worse than I am! You’re angry at me yet you doomed so many people in just 2 days!!” the grip on her neck gets tighter.

“Your hands are dirtier than mine… you’re a monster.”

Her neck suddenly snapped, breaking her head off her shoulders, falling off to the ground. The body falls limp on the ground slowly crumbling to dust. Stepping forward and giving one hard stomp on the decapitated head, the whole place dissipating in black smoke.

\--

The three children on the rooftop are panting, exhausted by the fight they are still in. Staring at the floating head and half-a-torso in front of them, Shinoa smiled “We’re close to being done… I hope.”

“It can’t attack us now, can’t it?” Kimizuki said. It suddenly flew up into the sky and swooped back down in an attempt to bite Yoichi. Realizing what was about to happen, the brunette quickly held up his bow and shot an arrow at their enemy pushing it back and ripping a chunk out of its side to fall below where their two other companions took care of it.

“You okay, Yoichi?” Kimizuki asked Yoichi who was still shaking in nervousness at the sudden attack.

“I’m fine, please don’t worry about me!” Yoichi replied.

“Okay, so it still has its teeth.” Kimizuki said.

“Yeah but did you notice that?” Shinoa asked without looking away from their enemy who is waiting for a chance for them to let their guard down. “It was somehow… slower. Slower than it was earlier. And it seems to have gotten weak. I mean we got to deal this much damage compared to earlier.”

“Yeah… I guess so.” The pink-haired boy replies while he adjusts his glasses.

“Just a bit more then!” Yoichi kneels and aims at his target and fires. Just as Shinoa said, it was getting slower letting all of his attacks hit unlike his futile attempts earlier.

Shinoa and Kimizuki joins in as they pushed the demon down on ground level to where their other two comrades are waiting. Getting down from the rooftop by climbing down from the tree at the side of the house- the same one they had used to get up there in the 1st place. Running a bit far back from where Mitsuba and Lacus stood, Yoichi proceeded to aim and fire at the demon from the ground and soon, only a bit of its torso and its head (with broken wings) are left behind. It flew at a level where Mitsuba and Lacus could finally hit it with their weapons. Crushing its head with her axe, Mitsuba had given the final hit, finally destroying the demon.

\--

It was already sunset when they got back to where Shinoa had left Yuu with Mika. When they finally arrived, they saw the black-haired boy sitting on the ground while cradling Mika in his arms. He doesn’t seem to have noticed them yet. Walking towards them, Shinoa soon realized that the blonde’s skin isn’t black anymore. With a light shake on his shoulders, Yuu finally looked up at Shinoa and noticed they weren’t alone anymore.

“You guys done?” he asked.

“Yep! We finally beat the demon.” Shinoa cheerily announced “And I see your boyfriend is finally back to normal, hmm?”

“Huh? I’m not… he’s not, uh--” Yuu blushed slightly at the teasing “Well, I guess he’s fine. He looks normal now.”

“Are you okay, Yuu-kun?” Yoichi worriedly asked “Your shoulder is bleeding!”

“What happened?” Kimizuki walked towards them and asked. The other followed behind soon surrounding Yuu and Mika.

“Mika-san bit him in his rage earlier.” Shinoa explained.

“I’m fine. It doesn’t hurt anymore.” Yuu replied, giving Yoichi a little smile.

\--

Mika closed his eyes. It’s not as if he could hold on forever no matter how much he continues to try. The last thing he remembers was seeing his mother lower him to the ground as the car continued to move. No matter how low she got, she doesn’t slip from where she sat at all. “I forgot you’re not really my mother. You’re actually a demon…”

He waited for his head to hit the ground and grind through his skin but the feeling never came. Opening his eyes, he found himself laying on the soft green grass of the park under a sunny sky in spring. He could hear voices of people having fun all around him with children on the playground and people walking their dogs. He slowly sat up and looked around- he could see people but their faces are blurred. They keep moving along like there wasn’t anything strange.

As he looked around, something caught his eye. Mika stood up to look at a bench underneath a tree a bit far away from him. On it sat a young boy and even thought Mika couldn’t see his face, he seemed familiar somehow. Taking a few steps at a time, Mikaela made his way to the bench and he was getting closer…

\--

“He’s opening his eyes!”

“Mika-kun!”

“Hey, are you okay?”

Mika opened his eyes and saw blurry figures looking down at him. When his vision cleared, he saw his friends’ worried faces as they crowd around him and ask him questions. “Mika… are you okay now?”

The blonde looks up to see Yuu and realized his head was on his lap. He tried to get up and move his arms and legs but his body seem to be restrained. “What… why am I?” he asked as he tried to look down and saw that his body was tied up with blankets turned into ropes.

“Oops…” Shinoa said as she got down to untie the restraints “Forgot. Sorry! You okay now?”

“Yeah, I guess. My body hurts from being tied up, though and my head kinda hurts a little but I’m fine. What happened?” Mika asked as he got up (with Yuu’s help) to stretch his aching body. “Thanks, Yuu-chan.” He said to the black-haired boy.

“You don’t remember anything, Mika-kun?” Yoichi asked. When the blonde shook his head, Yoichi explained “You acted weird in the basement and dug up the dead little girl’s body before passing out.”

“I did?”

“Yeah and then the corpse turned into a demon and we had to fight it.” Lacus added.

“Really? Is it still here? Did you guys beat it?” Mika asked as he looked around for any sign of an enemy.

“Yeah, we beat it. It’s wasn’t easy though.” Mitsuba said “It took longer than expected.”

“I see. Why was I tied up, anyways?”

Stepping forward, Shinoa answered “You got possessed. You went crazy for a while and attacked Yuu-san so we had to tie you up.”

Mika immediately turned around to look at Yuu. He quickly noticed a few scratches on the other boy but what caught his attention was the blood on Yuu’s shoulders. Pulling down his sleeves, Mika was able to see the wound where the blood came from. “I bit you?”

Yuu nodded “It’s okay though. I’m fine.”

“But still… I’m sorry.” Mika said as he pulled Yuu in for a hug.

Surprised by Mika’s sudden action, Yuu was confused about what to do. He felt the urge to hug the blonde back but settled for holding on to the side of the other boy’s clothes. “I said I’m fine. It’s not as if you knew what you were doing anyways.”

“How did you turn back to normal though?” Kimizuki asked.

“Oh, that’s right!” Shinoa placed a finger on her chin “I left you with Yuu-san while you’re still in ‘crazy’- mode. What happened after I left, Yuu-san?”

“Huh?” Mika released Yuu from the hug. The black-haired boy looked around him to see everyone waiting for his answer (with Kimizuki looking at him with suspicion in his eyes). “He passed out after that and he just got back to normal after a while. I didn’t do anything…”

Kimizuki was still eyeing him in suspicion as if an answer would just pop out if he continued to examine Yuu. The others were just in wonder about what could’ve happened while they were away and Shinoa checked Mika to see if his body is really back to normal.

“Maybe he went back to normal when we beat the demon?” Yoichi said

“Maybe but…” Shinoa replied “It doesn’t make sense. That demon was supposed to be just a decoy, right? To buy enough time for the real enemy to completely take over Mika-san’s body…”

“Maybe you were wrong?” Lacus said.

“But still… it’s really strange.” The purple haired girl wondered. She was so sure of it earlier. “Mika-san, did anything happen while you were unconscious? Felt anything weird?”

“Weird…?” then Mika remembered his old house, his parents and what happened “That’s right. I… woke up and I was back at my old house again and I saw my parents. And then…”

“Old house? Parents? What are you talking about?” Lacus asked in confusion.

“Could you tell us what happened, Mika-kun?” Yoichi asked.

“All I remember was that we went to the basement, right? After that, I just opened my eyes and realized I was back at my house- the one I lived in when I was a kid, before the orphanage. I was a kid again as well and my real parents were there. They…” Mika paused for a bit “They weren’t really the nicest people around. They tried to kill me before. My mom threw me out of our car as my dad drove. It’s why I was taken to the orphanage.”

Everyone’s faces paled as an image of a younger Mika, injured and dying on the road appeared in their minds. “That’s terrible. I’m sorry…” Yoichi said.

“It’s okay! I’m okay now.” Mika said, smiling “Everyone was nice in the orphanage and then I met my new mom. Anyways, in that weird dream earlier, it was going to happen again and even when I tried to fight back, I was still gonna die. But then something happened and it was over- my parents are gone, I wasn’t in the car anymore. I was at the park and it was peaceful and then…”

“And then?” Shinoa asked, waiting in anticipation as the next thing Mika would say might be the answer they were looking for.

“I saw something. I don’t remember what it was but I remember seeing something… familiar, I guess? Then I woke up and then this!”

“Oh… oh, I see.” The purple haired girl replied, disappointed at what she heard.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t remember.”

“It’s fine. You went through a lot, too.” Shinoa looks up to see that it’s already dark. Suddenly, the streetlamps turned on by themselves one by one.

“I guess they still work…” Mitsuba said as she looked around.

“We should go back now. It’s already late. The others are probably worried about us now.” Shinoa said as she turned around to walk back to where their secret base is. The others soon followed. Despite just ending their previous predicament, the children are still wary of their surroundings and are keeping their guard up just in case something suddenly comes out to attack.

The park still had a few lamps turned on but the path to their base didn’t have any lamps leading to it. Fishing out a small flashlight from his pocket, Kimizuki lead the way back to their base. As they walked along the path, Kimizuki noticed something on the ground. Examining it, it appeared to be blood. He shone his flashlight on the ground in front and saw that there were more drops of blood on the ground… all of it trailing back to their base.

They all ran as fast as they could and saw that their base didn’t have any lights on and it was quiet. Nobody seemed to be inside. The others took out their phones or flashlights to use as a light to check the area. Kimizuki and Mika were the ones who went inside. The place was a mess and there were some streaks of blood in many of the items and on the floor. Mika walked over farther in the room as Kimizuki checked near the entrance. The pink-haired boy then heard Mika scream.

“Mika, what happened? Why did you--?” Kimizuki looked at what the other boy was pointing at. The others came running as well to see what the commotion was about.  
To their horror, on the floor right in front of them is the corpse of one of the 3 other orphans they were taking care of- a little girl named Juri. On the wall in front of them, written in blood reads the words:

_‘Come find me.’_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so happy!! I'm so close to the parts of the story I had originally planned. :)

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for the lack of MikaYuu in this chapter. The two boys will finally meet in chapter 2. By the way, Takumi isn't mine. He's a character for the game Re: Kinder and yes, he died there, too. I apologize to poor Takumi for killing him again but I needed casualties.


End file.
